The Otherside
by smellyia
Summary: Years after the Volturi leave the Cullens, Alice awakens into a new reality where her family is torn apart and war seizes their very existence. Post BD AU. Canon Couples. Full summary inside.
1. How Far Can I Slide

**Summary**: After the Volturi seemingly leave the Cullen's in peace, Alice's visions begin to fade and her reality takes on a shaky existence. Unsure of what is in her mind and what is actually happening, Alice becomes lost in herself until one day everything changes.

After what she thinks is life in a constant state of flux, Alice awakens into another life seventeen years later where vampires are hunted and civil war between the Volturi, rebels and a ghost faction is ripping apart the supernatural world they live, including her own family. Lost and confused, she is rescued by her family from the one person she thought she could always count on only to find out she had been presumed dead for the past five years.

Lies within lies layer the intentions of many and sides must be chosen as the war escalates and a new invisible threat rises from betrayal.

**Disclaimer For Entire Story**: None of the characters or histories shaping this work of **FAN**fiction belongs to me. They are the sole property of Stephenie Meyer and no copyright infingement is intended. Also, the title of this story comes from The Red Hot Chili Peppers as does most of the chapter titles - any deviation of this will be noted at the beginning of chapters.

**Disclaimer for Author's Purposes**: This fic is a Post BD AU taking place predominately 17 years after the events of Breaking Dawn with the central focus being Alice. Canon remains intact. Canon Couples also remain intact - for the most part. I will post a timeline as well as any pertinent information pertaining to this fic on my profile. Also, please remember that I write this as purely a work of **FAN**fiction - nothing else. Reviews are always greatly appreciated and personally responded to, however, my anonymous reviews are turned off. _**WARNING** The first chapter is meant to be confusing, as our protagonist is in a state of confusion,_but this is not a fic of instant gratification and will take some time to build as revelations come in each chapter. Thank you, if you choose to hang in there!

~oOo~

**The Otherside**

**Chapter One ~ How Far Can I Slide**

_ALICE_

She wonders how long someone can pretend. After all, she figures, pretension is what makes the world go round; what possesses someone to pay more money than they make in a week for a pair of shoes, what convinces someone to smoke their first cigarette, what justifies someone to let the greater population fight a personal war.

Fallacies are so much more powerful than any one person really knows. They encompass so many of the cardinal sins, the sins Moses wielded above his head on a tablet God himself personally approved; vanity, greed, coveting, to name just a few. She thinks He could have saved Moses some wind and numerals with a slight restructuring of those commandments. But she'd leave that to the Pope and Born-Agains.

A common dislike amongst the human populace is being lied to, but what constitutes a lie? If you believe it then it's real, no? It's as real to you in the moment that you accept those words are fact as anything else. Its veracity is sealed the moment your decisions are swayed by information you hold true.

These are the lies, those powerful fallacies, she tells herself more often than not because she has no other explanation. These are the truths she faces when her mind defogs enough for any semblance of clarity. Thankfully, this is no longer a common occurrence.

Thankfully, her life has become such a jumble of vague memories interspersing with questionable visions and haze filled days any heroin junkie would be blessed to welcome, because if what she thinks is real has any basis in truth, she would rather slit her throat if that were possible.

Even though she cannot discern between fact and fiction most of the time and any of her thoughts are suspect, she begs that this moment, with him standing beside their bed, to be real.

His fresh shirt hangs loosely from his shoulders while busying himself with the mundane process of buttoning his cuffs. Even without speed, he radiates a steady grace with every movement not unlike the soldier he once was. Lying on the bed with one delicate leg exposed over the cotton sheet, Alice can see the ever present scars peeking from under his shirt sleeves, a faint reminder of realities she accepted before they even met.

"You should have waited for me to hunt, love."

Alice turns herself away from him, feigning a satiated stretch. "I thought you would appreciate some time with Emmett and Edward."

Jasper sits down on the bed and leans over, trailing his lips up her back until he reaches her neck. "You could spend some time with me."

She laughs, attempting to infuse the sound with genuine feeling. "I thought that was what we just spent the afternoon doing."

Jasper leaves one last kiss behind her ear and stands up, a stiffness replacing his previous languid demeanor. She feels his stare on her back, the unanswered questions hanging over them. She closes her eyes, stops breathing, prays for him to let it go just once more, to understand the need as she had understood his for all years past.

The door shuts behind him without a sound.

She rolls over, closes her eyes and continues to pretend

~oOo~

_This time when she opens her eyes it is a special day. _

_Alice places the last delicately shaped daisy on the sugar bouquet. Underneath, the pale pink fondant stretches across the top of the confection without a wrinkle and the scripted Happy Birthday just fit off to the side. She purses her lips in evaluation. Something is still missing. Quickly, Alice fashions a bow out of the remaining icing to put around the daisy stems. She is confident Renesmee won't be able to resist at least a small bite regardless of her continued proclivity for human blood these last five years. No matter her niece's palate, today is her fifth birthday and every little girl has a soft spot for sweets - hybrid or not. _

_Absentmindedly massaging her temples, Alice begins the task of placing tiny pearl drops along the circular base of the cake. She steadfastly ignores the increasing throb at the bottom of her neck and concentrates on aligning the dots perfectly. She forces a smile rather than grimace, but as soon as she thinks her happy thoughts have got her burgeoning headache licked, a shadow flashes before Alice's eyes. Her hand slips and she becomes still; sniffing, looking, seeing nothing but the line of icing haphazardly marring her perfect pearls. _

_It is absolutely nothing. _

_She wipes the icing up with a towel and proceeds to complete this final task. Today isn't the day to confuse herself with something so small as a headache._

_Alice gives the cake one last glance over and with a decided nod approves her final work. She opens the stainless steel door of their industrial sized refrigerator, a necessity with a wolf pack frequenting the premises, and is hard-pressed to find a suitable spot with the plethora of dishes for the evening's festivities taking up space. Moving over Jacob's favorite chicken pasta, Alice places the cake front and center on the middle shelf. _

_Closing the door with a smile of satisfaction, she sways from a wave of dizziness. She blinks rapidly and as fast is it came on, the feeling and her smile dissipates, leaving only the remnant of a headache and a far off buzzing in her ears. Deciding fresh air might improve her senses, she leaves the kitchen for the air outside in search of any wolf and the quiet blankness their presence can promise._

_Alice emerges from the house and lays in the grass, feet away from where Jacob and Seth erect a tent in the back yard. Storm clouds continue their assault on the blue sky, taking over the sun with the help of a brisk wind. Rare thunder echoes in the distance and Alice relishes the feeling as the sound reverberates through her bones down to her fingertips. She doesn't even attempt to see how the inevitable rain will effect the party, she just remains prostrate, loving the silence in her head. A small smile of relief graces her lips._

"_Enjoying the madness before the mayhem, love?"_

_Alice peeks through her lashes playfully. "Why, do I look crazy?" _

"_Always." Jasper lowers himself to the ground next to his wife and takes her hand into his, drawing their entwined fingers to his lips. "Everything quiet?"_

"_I wouldn't say that. How anyone can get any peace around here with those two mutts over there screwing up that tent is beyond me."_

_Jacob turns towards the couple. "I heard that blood-sucker!"_

_Alice laughs and waves him off, turning her attention back to Jasper. "It's about to get louder around here, that thunder will be over head soon."_

"_Thunder?" Jasper looks at the sky, his brow crinkled in thought. "Did you see it?"_

_Alice sighs. "No, off in the distance. I heard it awhile ago."_

"_I must not have been paying attention."_

"_Your senses are dulling in your old age." Alice's eyes close once again, hoping she has delayed any further questioning about her premonitions. It is no secret amongst her family that they have been lacking. However, she has at least tried to hide her soft stalking of any wolf in their vicinity. If anyone knew how bad the headaches, fogginess and dizzy spells had become…well, she just doesn't want to deal with the hovering and questions. _

_Jasper lifts her head and lays it in his lap. He strokes the side of her face. His hand travels to her hair and threads his fingers through, massaging her scalp. She breathes in and out, emptying her thoughts of anything but nothingness and the feel of his hands on her skin. _

"_You can talk to me."_

"_I know..." Alice pauses. The worries about her visions bubble just beneath the surface, but today is a special day and she wants it to be about something else rather than her own fears. "Today let it just be about Renesmee." _

_Jasper nods and resumes his calming ministrations. She feels a wave of peace and contentment float over her person and silently thanks him for the effort by leaning her face further into his touch. Her eyes close and she hates herself for it because she never knows what she would open her eyes to._

~oOo~

With every decision, no matter how minute, there is a moment between intentional thought forming and actual execution of the action. Even with the quickest reflexes, the brain still originates the movement of a body - even a vampire's. It is just more likely a vampire will be aware of this moment, this thought.

It is in this millisecond before Alice opens her eyes and goes to unlock her door that she stops frozen in place, outstretched arm, hand gripping her cold metal key. She isn't so old as to not remember what Bella used to fondly call her "human" moments, but she is old enough to note the oddity of this particular action and wonders when she started to lock her doors again. After all, deadbolts pose no obstacle for the monsters that are likely to hunt her.

Alice shakes her head, rattling the thought from her mind and inserts the key, twisting. She enters the house, hyper-aware senses indicating the domain empty. Shutting the door behind her, she lets out a sigh of relief and sits her purse down on the foyer table, catching a glimpse at the reflection in the overhanging mirror.

Completely still, she notes no obvious changes; unblemished skin, no bags under her eyes, pert nose, short black hair, golden eyes - nothing exceptional really. Her eyes are all she truly cares about.

Alice turns back toward the door and one decisive click later, the house holds the illusion of security.

She walks into the Cullens' spatial living room where floor to ceiling windows betray the day. The sun dips beneath the trees surrounding the home and once again, Alice is reminded of Edward's insistence to claim twilight as their most vulnerable time. She doesn't agree.

The dark is what scares her the most. It's what clouds her visions and when the fog begins to permeate her mind, cloying at the thin line of her consciousness, she finds silent retreat into the fade of black her only option. Alice's mind has been silent from coherency for ten years now. Ten years from that fateful birthday, a perfect cake and lying in the grass with her head in Jasper's lap.

No matter how many days, seconds or hours tick by, she feels her visions on the periphery, a finger's breath away, hungry - no starving, to be released. Their vicious claws pulsate with hatred at her inability to _see_, mocking and hurt at the same time, pressing upon her until she feels her chest will collapse from the force. But relief never comes and only the merest traces of fear remain. The blood always remains.

Alice's family trickle in as the sun completes its decent. They sit in varying positions and degrees around the room. Emmett and Jasper watch football, an occasional enthusiastic whoop or profanity falling from their mouths when appropriate. Renesmee and Carlisle peruse an oversized decrepit book translated in Latin and written for knowledge's sake. Even Esme and Rosalie find some measure of occupation in the magazines written purely for vanity's sake. It seems so long ago that Alice would indulge and comment with them on the latest this or that, even tease Rosalie about doing something better, unconcerned by any pertinent happening in the world outside their little coven.

The absence of Edward and Bella had long ago lost its sting. His mind's eye cannot handle the torment with which Alice now lives. If she is honest, it is a small blessing. She finds it hard not to let her thoughts stray to unflattering commentary on Edward's supposed anguish. He knows nothing beyond Bella and the true horrors of her existence would be too much for his naiveté. She absolves him, but they both know abandonment is a hard mistress to appease.

She never leaves the windows, facing the oncoming night, unwilling to let the darkness creep in without at least a weak objection while ignoring the surreptitious glances of the remaining Cullens who promised to leave her in peace after so many failed attempts at bringing her any. She may not be able to _see_ but she can feel their open eyes as she closes her own.

~oOo~

_Alice takes away her hand from rubbing her eyes and sees the cake on a table under the tent, almost surreal on its lonely stand. Everyone sings a jubilant halted rendition of Happy Birthday to Renesmee, but the sound is muffled in Alice's ears. She looks over to Rosalie who seems impressed and Alice tries to find satisfaction, but there is a glaze of fog over everything in front of her. _

_The thunder from earlier rumbles once again, but no one else comments on the threatening weather so Alice remains quiet, not wanting to spoil the moment, but feeling like the picture in front of her is only a scene from a grainy film. She sits in the closest chair, hoping her shaking hands go unnoticed. _

_The song ends and candles are blown out. Only the wolves and Renesmee eat slices and give exclamations of appreciation and delight over the dessert. She thinks she smiles in response to their proclamations, but there is now a cotton barrier over her perception. Minutes later, Seth and Jacob leave Alice's close proximity to retrieve the rest of Renesmee's presents. In the future, Carlisle will suppose their absence is the catalyst for the beginning._

_The attack comes on like a freight train, without warning and unforgiving, leaving only indiscernible wreckage in its devastating wake. As Alice's eyes roll to the back of her head and she falls to the ground, mouth gaping, the occasion of Renesmee's fifth birthday becomes a forgotten treasure. _

Terrified he would disappear in a cloud of ash if she let down her guard even for a moment, Alice clung to Jasper in a fevered desperation. He gripped her even tighter, dragging them both deeper into the forested night. Occasionally, they stop long enough for Jasper to sniff the air, listening to the secrets floating, changing their course as the scent of their enemies crept closer.

_Alice writhes. She twitches and claws. Gaping marks appear in the ground beneath her fingernails. Ethereal voices from beyond her shrouded mind call her name but she can't see where they come from, can't find that path home. The freedom of the last five years since Renesmee's birth and the Volturi retreating back to their citadel erodes with every erratic jerk of her body. _

Jasper's eyes stared back, piercing, calculating, blood red - a mirror image of Alice's. The human blood coursed through them with an almost foreign strength - it had been so long. But no satiety could belie the deed of making his eyes such a color.

They couldn't rely on her visions anymore. Too many enemies, too many intentions. Plans within plans. The endgame had become so convoluted. Alice saw nothing but the decimation on the way to get there.

As their enemies approached, snarling putrid spittle, the lovers nodded to each other, understanding hanging between them like a crucible of carnage. Jasper gave Alice one more kiss. Gentle. Enduring.

"I promise to find you in this life or the next." He turned and bared his teeth at the army hunting them.

_Alice's screams are no longer silent. They cut through the daylight and no amount of shaking or pleading can make them stop. Jasper clings to her form, agony distorts the scars on his face. He whispers. He coaxes. He pets. He soothes. Nothing but incoherent obscenities and unintelligible cries erupt from her mouth._

_Edward rocks far from the rest of his family, hands clutching his hair. He doesn't understand what is happening and her pain becomes too strong for him to overcome. Before he falls completely fetal, Bella picks Edward up and runs. _

She stepped over so many limbs and dead, trying her best to avoid the piles of ash. She came upon Bella and Edward overcome with the graveyard in front of them, but still working diligently to set the trap. She hugged them both, thanking some intangible source for sparing their lives. In her relief, she let her vigilance waver, long enough for the warrior to descend. Her mind registered one word to her family - run.

_After an eternity of seconds, Jacob and Seth return in wolf form, skidding to a halt before the family. Alice stills. Her eyes flutter and open. She stares past the sea of faces in front of her, letting the sunbeams attempt to beat down her impervious eyes. The lighted blindness becomes the last moment of clarity she will have. _

_Jasper grasps her tightly, whispering tenderness in her ear promising to take her somewhere beautiful if she would just come back. Esme hovers, wringing her hands, praying to God to spare her child. Carlisle checks her various body parts, asking pertinent questions she assumes she answers correctly. Rosalie and Emmett hold each other, completely at a loss as to what to do except watch their sister suffer. Renesmee's hand lies on her exposed ankle, asking in her special way if she is going to be okay. _

_Alice never answers back._

_As it becomes apparent Alice will be fine for the moment, Edward and Bella return to them. His face is distorted into a crinkled anguish. He hesitates before approaching too close and Bella prompts him forward. Alice looks at her beloved brother._

"_It's okay."_

"_W-what...that was different," he croaks out, "I don't understand what kind of vision that was."_

_Alice closes her eyes, blocking the stares boring into her and thinking of blinding sunlight. "That's because it wasn't. I don't know what's happening to me."_

~oOo~

Alice smells Renesmee right before she crosses the threshold of the room and opens her eyes, feigning alertness. Mentally chastising herself for not noticing sooner, she turns her body and corners of her mouth to face her grown niece.

"You're getting quicker." Renesmee's lithe form glides past her, the years of maturity evident in every step.

"Hardly."

"You can't expect results overnight when you have spent so long relying on one sense to translate the world for you."

"My visions are not just a sixth sense. They're part of me."

"They _were._"

Alice angles her head, looking Renesmee directly in the eye, unable to stop venom leaking from her gaze at the blatant truth.

"No one else will say it."

"Because they are considerate."

"No, Alice, they are indulgent and delusional." Renesmee's voice lowers into a barely audible octave no person without supernatural capabilities could hear. _"__This__is__not__your__life.__"_

Alice blinks from shock. "What did you say?"

"This is not how you want to live your life."

Alice moves quickly, stopping no more than a needle's width from Renesmee, her mouth twists into a sneer. She searches her niece's passive face looking for answers, trying to find a source of the madness she felt consuming her body like a swarm of cicadas blindly buzzing until death takes them over.

Unperturbed by the anger she evokes, Renesmee brings her hands to Alice's shoulder, a gentle reminder of where, _who_ she is.

"You need to hunt."

Alice closes her black eyes, regaining composure. "Jasper will wonder why I didn't wait for him…again."

"He will accept whatever excuse you give him. Run with me."

Choked, Alice nods and they leave.

She feels the ground beneath her feet as she pounds her way through the forest. All traces of Alice's former delicacy left behind in an urge to escape. She lets the natural force of the hunt transform her into something primal, uncontrollable. A metallic earthen smell wafts to her nostrils. Blood. Leaving recognition of her former self offers only minor relief, but she grabs it with a desperate ferocity, squeezing mercilessly at the protests in the back of her mind.

With a slight angling of her body, Alice alters her trajectory bringing her within feet of her prey. A new smell - _fear_. She takes it in, coddling this precipice of the inevitable between prey and predator like the bloom of first love. The mammal only needs a second for understanding to dawn, but it is too late. Alice leaps, arching over the grass covered ground between them. The wild animal begins the final eternal struggle as her hand cups its throat. She pauses, waiting for the throws of limbs to calm, for acceptance to dawn. Teeth bared, she feels the air thrum with the thrill of killing, the power surrounding this act organically filling her with a satiety long overdue. With an unintelligible cry begging for forgiveness, Alice eviscerates the sinew and bone on display, sucking and suckling, letting the orgasmic feeling of creating death encompass her.

Overcome with an exhaustion unfamiliar to her vampire life, Alice falls limp over the carcass, face nuzzling the silent neck. Heady from the rush of blood, she thinks the most satisfied addict surely would not feel this euphoric. Sniffing, she notices an awkward scent, nothing game-like as she has been used to, but fuller, richer. Her eyes snap open, her hangover tampered down. Smooth creamy skin fills her sight. A body lay curled crab-like in her arms, similar to that of a child seeking the comfort and protection of a mother.

Alice slowly draws back. A definite jaw line angling out, much like her own, comes into view. Panic grows in her chest. A mouth once capable of intelligent speech hangs slack, never to utter another sound. Glazed over eyes see nothing. Beautiful tumbling blond hair matted with its own life. Blood. Human.

Dropping the body, Alice scrambles away. Renesmee comes into her peripheral vision, disbelief evident on her face. Or is it a smile? Her mouth moves, clearly speaking to Alice, but she doesn't hear anything. The scene before her swirls, Renesmee fading into the distance, a static buzzing takes over any sound. The face of a young hiker, a girl, the last thing she sees before her eyes roll back and what she hopes is a final blackness takes over.

~oOo~


	2. Separate My Side

**The Otherside**

**Chapter Two ~ Separate My Side**

**~o0o~**

_ALICE_

The loud booms from afar echoes vibrations throughout her body. The sound comes erratically, without rhythm, but too concise to be thunder. Alice counts them, trying to keep time like a heartbeat, but finds the sound impossible to anticipate. Her consciousness hovers just beyond, a cloud between her and the sounds and sights. Unknowing what is on the other side and more than a little scared by the voice in her head telling her to stay where she is safe, the desire to push through wins.

She shakes violently with the next boom and finally, Alice's stiff eyelids move purposefully. She feels pricks all over her skin as the assault on her body becomes heavier than gradual pelting. There is a cold hard surface under her body. She sniffs. Steel.

An open and close of Alice's lids finds her airborne before haphazardly landing on unsteady feet. She takes two unintentional steps forward, almost plunging face-first into an off-white wall. Forcing her legs to bend, she effectively pulls herself into a crouch. She swivels forward with an inelegant tremble. Clenching her eyes shut, she grabs her head in an attempt to squeeze the residual fogginess out. Her innards swirl, everything upside down and inside out. Concentrating on just being aware, she stills. She settles, pushing herself to recognize her own body through the haze of confusion.

With slow deliberation, Alice opens her eyes, determined to see with clarity. She takes in the windowless room, darting looks to every corner. Satisfied there is no immediate threat, she inches taller until standing straight, taking her time in part to disorientation, in part to fear. She looks down and sees a standard hospital gown encasing her form, stopping at her mid-thigh, bare calves and feet sticking out from underneath.

Another boom shakes the sterile paint from the walls in chunks of plaster. Scaffolding showers onto the tile floor and multiple bare countertops. A wheel based portable table lies on its side amidst the shards and liquid of a broken glass vial. Syringes with capped needles surround the mess causing Alice to check the skin of her arms. They are as smooth and pale as the day she was turned. She remembers she is impervious to tracks.

Fluorescent lights swing over the pile of debris collecting on the steel table she laid on, the left over reverberation still evident in the swinging bag hanging off a pole fixed to the top right corner of the table. Alice's attention draws straight to the bag, the milky red remnants still evident and pungent in her nostrils. She remembers enough of Carlisle's medical machinations to know that this receptacle is used to hold intravenous fluid or medication, even blood. Tubing dangles from the bottom of the bag, its end leaving a wet red trail on the floor as if it had been ripped out of an orifice rather than intentionally removed.

She sniffs again, the traces of an unknown chemical flooding her scent. She rubs her nostril and looks at her fingers - dried blood. Bringing her hand back, she takes a slower draw of breath. The smell triggers her inner nature. She licks, knowing the crumbles will do nothing. Her face crinkles in disgust. There is a foreign taste and it does not belong.

The loud noises come quicker, closer. Beams groan under the onslaught. Fissures grow along the walls allowing distinct voices to filter through with a cacophony of shouts and despairing screams. An alarming wail sounds off somewhere in the distance with an oncoming urgency.

Alice doesn't think, she moves, not with the grace of something ethereal but with the frantic purpose of a trapped animal. She leaves her corner and goes straight for the bag and tubing, wrapping and tucking them securely in the tie of her gown, before attempting to open the door. She turns the knob, pulls once, then twice. Nothing happens. Stuck. Two steps back and she lifts her leg, kicking the door off its hinges. She smirks as the splintered wood flies across the outer hallway before becoming complete kindle against the distal wall.

She peers around the doorway seeing nothing but more sterile space. Only sickened flickering lights illuminate the hall from the whir of generator powered globes. She has no plan, no clue really, but only instinct to escape, so she runs.

Her feet propel her down the hallway as it twists into a labyrinth always moving forward, but never ending. Seconds feel like hours and frustrated sobs swallow her frightened hiccups.

Occasionally, she slows down enough to try focusing on the noise to lead her out, but the volume is too high and overwhelms her senses.

A fork in her path stops Alice cold. One route is clear with dim light, the other filled with smoke – clearly a bad idea. She chooses the hall with light and runs until a door blocks her way. She breaks through with her shoulder, not bothering with the knob and steps inside a darkened room. Unsure which way to go and with only the light from her back to guide her, she starts to retreat until the smell of decay draws her inward. She sniffs and closes her eyes and knows the this smell, she knows the emission of gas as cells decompose and expel their remaining life force. It is foul and Alice can picture what lays rotting, but it is alluring as well and she cannot help herself.

Stepping from the doorway, shadows reveal themselves. Glassy gazes look back at Alice from all points. An arm falls from a steel table with another shake of the building. Its mottled skin is cold without being touched and a needle is embedded in the bluing extremity. Unable to tear her eyes from the scene, she takes in every table – dozens of them, every head of lank hair, every half closed lifeless eye. Another boom and the body to which the hanging arm belongs to topples on the floor with a deadened thud. Alice is thrown to her knees either by the centrifugal force of the building coming down around her or by her own internal reaction, she is not sure which.

Choking on her own screams, she scrambles backwards on hands and knees away from the horror before her eyes. Once removed from the room, she reaches for the door to shut away the memory, but remembers in her naïve fear, she destroyed it. Turning, she runs the way she came and rushes down the smoke laden hall she previously thought a poor choice.

Alice is not ten seconds down the hall before a gray haze takes over sight, but she presses on thinking after what she just saw, a little blindness may be her only motivating force. The smoke begins to burn in her throat and she is forced to imprison her sobs. Only when her feet catch and she goes crashing into a flight of stairs does she free her cries of pain and terror.

She pulls herself up the stairs and bursts through one last door. Scared the other side holds another gruesome scene of bodies and needles, she is surprised by sunlight, not blinding, but filtered through trees. Coming to a complete halt, Alice is encompassed by the onslaught of noises she only vaguely heard earlier. The sound is almost debilitating. Her head pounds and she just knows another blackout is coming and is terrified at the thought of waking up somewhere else yet again. But the darkness never comes, it never drags her down. Instead, she remains lucid and her sight finally converges with her hearing and smell.

All around dirt tainted smoke billows in black plumes. She cannot see a true path of resistance so she looks for the least. Before she can move, an explosion from behind flings her and chunks of the building several feet in the air, deciding a route for her. There is nothing forgiving as her body hits the ground in a shower of dirt and rock. Rolling over, dead leaves, patches of grass and pieces of smoldering roof cling to the shredded tatters of her gown. Dirt cakes her feet and ankle as she angles her neck to look back at the structure she just escaped. With a thunderous roar, the remnants of dry wall and concrete falls inward until only a pile of rubble exists.

From the ground she cannot locate any cars she might hijack for escape or even a parking lot. Aside from the building, there is no asphalt or even a delineating dirt path separating the vast expanse of trees. The whole existence of this place is a perplexing gash marring what should be only eroded by time and elements.

She stands up and sees she is not alone. A plethora of bodies blur together in violent dances of death around her. The movement is so fast, even for a vampire's eyes, she cannot make out what belongs to whom in the massive tangle of limbs. To her left, a series of grunts and snarls erupts until the cracking tear of bone and skin pierce the air, ending the skirmish closest to her. Alice stares, disbelieving, as the vampire left standing locks eyes on her.

Alice stumbles, falling back onto a pile of ash. Horrified, she looks at her hands smeared gray and begins to scream. She screams until her voice is raw. She stumbles upright and tries to run from the killer, but no matter which way she turns, there is no escape. The fight is on her back, chasing her down like a sewer rat.

The vampire speeds toward her holding a gun and momentarily, she is confused by his weapon. No bullets will hurt her today. It is when he throws the gun over his back to free up his meaty hands that she realizes he knew exactly how to end her. She feels it in her gut that no amount of fortitude or wishing will give the strength she lacks to survive this attack, but she resolves to only go out standing.

She braces herself, ready. But she is not and when he hits her with the force of a nuclear warhead, she is only held in place by his fist digging into her rib cage. Her skin rips and her bones crack, reminiscent of the vampire's last victim. She feels him clumsily tearing into her chest cavity and thinks there is no possible relief from this pain. He pulls her face close to his and spits, disgusted by the sight of her. He rages in another language she suspects is Spanish, but cannot be sure. It is a shame, she thinks, that the last words uttered to her in this life are filled with a vitriol she doesn't understand. She decides to pretend they are of comfort from her family, from no matter how hard she tries, Alice is forced to face the inevitability of the moment. There is no one holding her hand as her body is torn apart. There is no one whispering as she gulps air like a fragile human. There is no quickly as her demise begins, another vampire wearing ragged clothing leaps from above, landing on the guard's back. Her attacker only gets one snarl and then his head is gone. His hand inside her falls out. Her body is still one and her eyes still see. Her rescuer stares at her, inquisitive almost. She does not recognize him, nor he her, but there is a mutual curiosity and one-sided gratitude until additional shouts coming their way interrupt any burgeoning conversation. He turns and runs into the fray. She stands and runs away, clutching her open runs through the brush and forest feeling twigs slap her indiscriminately. Logs break apart in the wake of her chaotic escape. Unsteady, she bumps into trees taking out gashes as easily as dried bread breaks apart. She bursts into a clearing and stops, bent over heaving. She hisses, causing her chest muscles to contract and expand, forgetting she does not need to breathe, she does not need to push her muscles. She extends her mouth, trying to absorb some of the pain as she pries her hand away from the wound. A shifting of feet stop her. She looks up and it's the eyes that stop the world from , with her chest flailing open, with her mind in so much disarray and with her voice choking on the words stands _him_, her waiting lover, just like she waited for him all those years ago. She falls to her knees, so thankful for his beautiful scarred face. So thankful he would take her away now. It would be less than a second for him to cross the thirty feet separating them and take her into his arms. But the time goes by with the thought and she is still is forced to really look, to truly see what is standing before her. It is his soldier's stance and his blond hair. She has no doubt if he opens his mouth it would be that southern drawl that sent shivers throughout her impervious body. It is the face of her most beloved. It is the face of a stranger as it contorts from surprise, confusion, disbelief, suspicion then is no golden comfort enveloping her, only a red rage. He spits out curses and obscenities at her. He calls her a fraud and the hole in her chest increases tenfold. He screams the question _who__the__fuck__do__they__think__they__are__trying__to__pull__this__on__him_. He will show them how their pathetic attempts go over. He approaches her, violence pushing every step. She remembers he is only thirty feet away, but there are others fifteen feet is swept into arms and watches as her beloved howls while they make their escape. Her arms remain outstretched, begging for the chance to talk to him, because she knows she can make him see reason. Everything is just too muddled, too mixed up, too bizarre. The tirade building within her catches at her throat as she looks to her second rescuer and sees only the beauty the woman has always been complimented for."Rosalie?""Yes, Alice. It's me.""Where are we going?""As far from Jasper as we can get you."

**~o0o~**

Alice can feel the deceleration of their travel in the slowing of her torso's rhythmic jostling. Her prone position and chest injury only allows her to see trails of dirt and grass, but no pavement. She suspects they are still in the woods, maybe close to Forks, but they are moving too fast to tell. Like Rose said, the goal is to get as far away as possibly from Jasper.

Alice doesn't agree.

Unfortunately, two hours of continued screaming and thrashing only landed her in the position she now found herself in; manhandled into compliance and dangling from the wrong side of Emmett's shoulder.

Their movement slows, but never to a walk, just an abrupt halt, and without ceremony, Alice is deposited onto her feet. Her legs are not ready for the pressure and she starts to fall back. Before she makes impact with the ground, Emmett catches her under her shoulders.

"Thanks, Em."

He squints and pulls her straight up, saying nothing, and goes to stand next to Rosalie who crossed her arms in a defensive stance. Alice notices immediately that both are in rugged clothing; thick camouflage cargo pants, steel-toed hiking boots, fitted black cotton shirts with black button downs over. There is a layer of dirt covering their faces and hair. They look like deranged soldiers of fortune in a horror flick waiting on the blushing virginal teenagers to pick the wrong spot for the night.

Their red irises do not help.

"Who are you?" snarls Rosalie.

Alice takes a step back, actually scared not by the situation, but these strangers in front of her. She hunches in on herself, arm grasping her own elbow across her body. She bends one barefoot against the other.

"W-what are you talking about? I'm Alice."

"Bullshit."

"Why are you acting like this? It's me, your sister, Alice!" Her face is contorted in despair as she reaches out to Rosalie.

Rosalie jumps away. "I don't know you. What game are you playing at, huh? You think you can just come in here and pretend to be our sister. BULL. SHIT. We aren't buying it."

"I don't know what you're saying. I'm me. It's me. I'm Alice," she pleads.

Emmett, quiet and measuring until now, speaks, "You see, whoever you are, that's sort of hard for us to believe. Alice has been dead for five years."

**~o0o~**

"I'm not dead. I'm not dead. I'm not dead." Alice repeats this mantra over and over as she sits, legs drawn up, on the dirt ground.

Rosalie has left, gone inside a dilapidated wood cabin Alice didn't notice earlier. After being told she is supposedly dead, Alice sat down in this position and has not moved in the last hour. She vaguely heard Rosalie mention to Emmett about calling Carlisle. Good, she thinks. He will sort this out. Just a matter of waiting and telling herself she is in fact, _not__dead_.

A small bag filled with red liquid falls in the dirt at her feet. She looks up at the thrower. Emmett angles his head toward her before sitting on a log not far away.

"You look starved."

Alice's hand darts out and she grabs the bag. She rips off the tab where tubing would go for a transfusion and is about to place her mouth there when she stalls. She sniffs. Human. She inspects. Deep red, not like the milky tinted blood from the lab….

"It's just blood, Alice. It's okay, I know you're hungry. Your irises are almost black."

"I thought I wasn't Alice." She saves her previous thought for later, until she can gather more information. The familiar thirst rises in her throat and she gives in to it, unconcerned that the blood is not "vegan." After a long deep drink emptying half the bag, she pulls away.

Feeling a mild calming of her nerves with satiety, Alice takes in her surroundings with more attention. It is obvious they are still in a forested area with trees and mountains surrounding them. She smells the air and finds it to be crisper, cleaner, than even Forks, but there is a heavier quality to it. There is humidity here not known in their Pacific Northwest home. The shabby building nearby must be where they live, she figures. Its graying wood and moss stained porch is a far cry from the previous Cullen homestead. She immediately decides Esme does not live here.

Her eyes are drawn just beyond the house to a denser section of trees. It is near impossible to see between the foliage and a light wind corrals the mass of green and brown in a ballet of nature until a direct opposition to this natural inertia is evident in a very unnatural rustling amidst the dance. Alice blinks and the ripple of disturbance is gone. She stares a moment more, looking for some explanation, but sees nothing. An odd feeling settles over her, but it is not anything that triggers a survival response. Her fears are too crowded at the moment to allow a few errant branches standing room in the subway of her mind.

Emmett is staring into a fire pit devoid of any ash, just rocks, twigs and wayward browning leaves. Alice takes a sip from her bag.

"Where are we?" she asks.

Emmett opens his mouth then closes it as the front door to the cabin slams shut.

"You don't need to worry about that." Rosalie does not mean it in a way that indicates she is actually concerned about Alice and will take care of things, but in a way that she doesn't need to _know._ "But what you _do_ need to worry about is giving us some answers."

"Answers? I already told you I don't know what is happening."

Rosalie narrows on her blood bag. Alice involuntarily clutches it closer to her chest. "Dammit, Emmett. Why the hell is she drinking from our stores?"

"She's starved and injured, Rose."

"We're in a damn forest! She can't eat there?"

"She would have never been able to hunt."

"You know those are for-" Rosalie cut herself off before giving away anything else. She looks hard at Alice. "You're just lucky you're not chained in a basement somewhere."

If Alice could cry, she would. "I don't understand why you're being so hostile, Rose. I didn't do _anything_ to you."

Rosalie's silence is telling. She doesn't buy into Alice's claim.

"I ALREADY TOLD YOU! I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING! I'M ALICE! WHY DON'T YOU BELIEVE ME?"

Emmett moves to Alice's side. She is on her feet, holding the blood like a baby doll. Her body crumples into his arms and she clutches at his shirt.

"Give it a break Rose."

Rosalie's jaw ticks from clenched teeth. "Fine, you babysit her then. Carlisle will be her soon and he can deal with this mess. I'm going inside."

Rosalie turns to leave, but before she makes it into the house, Alice extricates herself from Emmett's shirt. "I just have one question."

Rosalie stops, but doesn't turn around.

"What the hell are you guys wearing?"

**~o0o~**


	3. I Tear It Down And Then It's Born Again

**The Otherside**

**Chapter Three ~ I Tear It Down And Then It's Born Again**

**~o0o~**

_NAHUEL_

"It cannot be."

A young soldier stands directly in front of his commanding officer amidst the wreckage of the recent battle. His Captain, as the man is referred to, paces back and forth, hands on hips. While to the casual observer it seems he is looking around assessing the damage and spoils, to the attentive it is apparent his thoughts are elsewhere.

While the Captain works through recent events, the soldier watching is careful not to shift his feet. He stands still, posture straight, reciting in the back of his brain over the sound of his superior's voice that this time he will be _more._ What that means he is unsure of, but knows his human tendency to shuffle his feet is unbecoming of the vampire he wishes to be.

Perhaps he possesses the qualities of the infamous Bella Cullen; the restraint, control. He thinks maybe if he digs down deep, he will exhibit such and maybe someone will notice. He will not, however, on an arrogant whim defy those who matter and start a losing war like the infamous Bella Cullen.

His war is calculated, one that will be won.

"It cannot be."

The soldier elongates his dark tawny neck and masks his face, hoping to temper down his prideful temper during the wait for acknowledgement between the pacing and rambling. Irritation accumulates like December snow at the peak of the mountains to their backs, but no avalanche will come. He will keep it in check.

"It cannot be."

There are rumors that abound about this Captain. They say during the Southern wars with the states he helped another vampire to amass such an army of terror and vast territories for any coven that Aro himself was impressed. So impressed, he watched rather than acted. The soldier guesses the wars seemed so far from the Volturi before the age of industry and technology that they found the whole situation a rather amusing story rather than an actual threat.

The soldier finds this rather stupid.

Rumors abound that the Captain became sick of the killing and manipulation; that when he realized he was just another tool, a slightly larger pawn amongst smaller ones, his heart broke because when it came down to it, his reign of carnage and destruction was borne of love.

But there is one one more rumor that gives the soldier pause now. The one about the girl who was taken by the Cullen rebels.

The soldier knows about gossip, almost always reliable and steeped in truth at its core before oral tradition and whispers in ignorant ears perverts, can be valuable if the right ear overhears. The soldier is that one ear and when the whispers already running rampant amongst the ranks finally make their way to the soldier, his suspicions are confirmed.

The girl lives.

"It cannot be."

But it _is_and the soldier sees all the proof he needs right before his eyes.

"Sir?"

Jasper's head snaps to attention, but there is a cloud in his eyes, in his thinking.

"Sir, what cannot be?" he asks with only a faint trace of his Mapuche descent left in his accent.

Jasper blinks and once again his eyes become sharp, inscrutable. "Nothing. Do you have report for me, Nahuel?"

Nahuel pulls himself up a little straighter, but he cannot hope to cut the tower of a figure Jasper does. "I do, sir. With the most recent casualty count we have lost thirty-three. There are approximately five salvageable soldiers."

"Any rebel hostages?"

"Just one. A male. He is being held by two of our strongest and they are awaiting your interrogation."

Jasper nods. "What of the building?"

"There is little left of the actual structure above ground. Whatever was housed there is lost to us, but I do not suspect that is much. Below ground is another story."

"Which is?"

"Multiple human corpses. We found one room that might have had pertinent data, but the hard drive on the only computer has been smashed and there looks to be a pile of burned documents, possibly files."

"Have they been disturbed?"

"No sir."

"Excellent. I will see the rebel first and then survey the rest."

"Sir, I could go through the computer-"

"I will take care of it myself."

"Of course." Nahuel tightens his jaw, a tick of annoyance evident. He turns, hoping to hide his involuntary reaction from Jasper when he feels a wave of calm settle over him. Rolling his eyes, Nahuel stops.

"It's not that I don't think you can do it, Nahuel."

"Of course, sir."

"You can stop that. We aren't with the others."

Nahuel allows his shoulders to relax just a quarter of an inch, enough to put off an aura of disappointment. He sighs. "Yes, but we are active and if the others see you showing me any favoritism, I will suffer for it later."

Jasper nods and extends his hand to clasp Nahuel on the shoulder, but stops and instead clasps them behind his back.

"We've known each other for awhile now, haven't we?"

"Seventeen years."

"Sometimes I forget it's been that long since Alice and I found you."

Nahuel resists the urge to snicker. He doesn't quite see his situation as being _found_ like some squatting degenerate. He was hunted and lured under false pretenses. It wasn't until after that fateful day the true complications of his family's existence became apparent. Unfortunately, complications have a funny way of appearing too late to do anything about them.

Now, all he has left is Jasper, but soon, he will also have vengeance.

"It has."

"When you came to me after your family was killed, I wasn't sure if you would be able to see past your anger, to see who the true enemies are."

"I'll admit, it is hard still to reconcile the side with which we fight on."

"Just remember, the Volturi ruled in peace and secrecy for thousands of years before Bella Swan arrived in Forks. If she had never been brought into the fold, or if Edward would have just been strong enough..."

"My family would be here," Nahuel pauses, weighing the risk before speaking his next words, "As would Alice."

Jasper's face seizes into a stony facade.

"Jasper?"

"Alice is dead."

"Yes, but there was a girl today, I hear amongst the ranks."

Jasper reaches out with lightening reflexes, grabs Nahuel's collar and pulls the soldier's ear right up to his mouth.

A deadly whisper hisses out, "Alice is dead."

The knuckles of Jasper's fist dig into Nahuel's neck underneath his clothing. He feels a panic rise pushed on by waves of caustic anger, bordering on hate, emanating from Jasper. He feels the emotions seep into him and his eyes begin to narrow into slits.

Suddenly, Jasper startles and drops Nahuel to the ground. The air clears within seconds of the emotional fog Nahuel felt caught up in.

Jasper leans slightly forward and shakes his head while bringing his right hand up to cover his jaw. "I am sorry, Nahuel. It seems I am not at my most disciplined today."

"I understand. Your loss has been...profound."

"No more than anyone else's."

"Yes, but seeing the girl today has been difficult, I am sure."

"That was not Alice."

"Of course not." But Nahuel knows very differently. He turns away from Jasper and without waiting to see if his Captain is following, walks to where the sentries hold the rebel vampire hostage.

From behind he hears one question,"Is there suspicion?"

Nahuel smiles to himself, "No, sir. Nobody knows about Alice."

**~o0o~**

Nahuel sits back on a rock, bored. He pretends attention whenever they glance his way, but in actuality he only has two fingernails left to pick the dirt from.

He proceeds to finish his personal grooming while thinking that what really bugs him about vampires is how hard it is to torture information out of one. With humans the rules are very simple. Make a hole somewhere, anywhere really, in their fragile skin and anything you want to know pours from them. The whole process is quite efficient and almost beautiful in Nahuel's honest opinion. It makes him _almost_wish he once had the complete human experience as his full blooded brethren have.

Almost, but not quite.

With vampires, interrogation is almost always tedious. They heal too quickly or compensate for pain too well to make most physical attacks ineffective and what really hurts takes way too long to be efficient techniques for short term decision making in war. It could take weeks to starve a vampire into compliance and by then, they're generally too weak to be useful.

Useless.

Nahuel refrains from raising his eyebrow at the fingerless vampire sitting in front of Jasper in between the sentries. He would retrieve the fingers from the dirt floor by the group, but the fear Jasper is pushing from his emotional arsenal is known to occasionally cause unpleasant side effects.

Nahuel thinks it was just a month ago that one of Jane's favorite minions caught a whiff during another interrogation and ran for cover right into a canyon. Now, Nahuel realizes his kind and kin are pretty much invincible, but pretty much ends up being about ninety percent in reality and he is at least ninety-five percent sure that particular sentry's invincible body is lying in a multitude of pieces courtesy of the jagged rocks five hundred feet down.

From his rock, a good fifty yards away, Nahuel feels another influx of fear. The feeling claws up his throat and starts to restrict his lungs. Hyperventilation hovers close behind.

The rebel vampire strains against his captors and his eyes bug out disturbingly as he darts looks to every corner. He screams a guttural sound and collapses to his knees.

Just as Nahuel is letting out a ragged hurried breath, Jasper eases up on his assault.

"It is possible to feel worse, rebel. The mind is so terribly fragile and impressionable no matter how tough our skin is, don't you agree?" Jasper asks as he kneels down next to his victim.

"Traitor!"

Spit flies into Jasper's face. He wipes it off, unperturbed. Nahuel perks up, heightened anger could signal a breaking point.

"Depends on where you're standing. From where I am, semantics plays a large part. I'm not the one who calls myself a rebel," Jasper turns to look at Nahuel, "Isn't rebelling just a glorified word for betrayal of those who trusted you to adhere to the rules put in place for vampire society to live safely, peacefully even?"

"I could google it."

"Unnecessary, I think my point is clear." Jasper turns back to the vampire and clutches his face. The sudden onslaught of fear saturates the air, permeating every living being within range. Nahuel falls off his rock and is about to pick up and run when the feeling dissipates.

Jasper's voice rings out clear, commanding."What is your name?"

The vampire's eyes loll in his head and his face crinkles in confusion. "Dragos," he says with a slurred accent.

"Is that Romanian?"

Dragos nods.

"Who is your sire?"

"I do not know."

"You lie." Jasper focuses his eyes and hardens his mouth as if in concentration.

"No! No! I swear it!"

"Who told you of this place?"

"I-I'm not sure. I was with two others. We received a missive from the Rebel Cause weeks ago requesting backup. This was suppose to be reconnaissance only, but when we saw how many of you were here, it was too late to retreat and they said we would have to fight our way out. We didn't expect you to be guarding your facility so closely."

"Who?"

"The big one and the blonde."

Jasper's lip curls. "Where is everyone else in your party?"

"I don't know. I saw the two I came with die, but I did see a girl escape."

Jasper puts his face inches from Dragos. "What. Girl?"

"I-I didn't recognize her. Small though. I think her hair was dark, short. I helped her escape."

"That, you did."

Jasper stands up and nods to the two sentries holding Dragos' arms. With a crack, both his arms detach from his body. The larger sentry puts his hand over Dragos' screaming mouth to muffle the sound and encircles his neck with a meaty arm. One more yank and the clearing is silent.

Jasper thanks them both before filling them up with rage.

"I wanted to do the head!"

"Stop being a bitch!"

The sentries collide into a jumble of fists until a head rolls.

Jasper switches to a complacent calm and looks over the remaining vampire.

"Do you know the penalty for harming a brother, solider?"

"Yes, Captain."

One more rip and no one who heard confirmation of the girl except Nahuel and Jasper are left.

"Was that really necessary, Captain?"

"Absolutely. Burn them all."

"Before I get to cleaning up your mess, did you notice Dragos calling the facility _yours_?"

"I did."

"Is it?"

**~o0o~**

Unlike torture, vampires are very efficient at clearing debris. Their speed and strength make those only good for brute force an excellent labor force. Nahuel is pleased, to say the least, that while Jasper has been playing bogey man in the closet with Dragos, an entryway to the lower depths of the facility is now discernible by their reliable army.

Nahuel follows Jasper down a set of stone stairs into the subterranean corridor with a small contingent of soldiers behind them at the ready for any eventuality. The dim lights barely illuminate a walking path around debris. Plaster dust from fallen pieces fills the air, but the stone walls exposed behind the fragile material show a fortified structure. Jasper nods and breathing ceases. The group moves forward into the depths.

As they come to the doors, most hanging off their hinges or gone all together, Jasper pauses and sends soldiers in. The first section of hall contains mostly rooms, a barracks of sorts. The sounds of overturned beds and drawers being rifled through echoes off the walls and soldiers repeatedly report back the same thing; beds, sheets, one bedside table, no personal effects, the scent of vampires and humans.

Jasper exhales in frustration and moves on to the next area. Over and over again, the same thing. Rooms with nothing but the bare minimum of functioning. Eventually, they come across a storage room with hospital gowns, basic grooming supplies, intravenous tubing, intravenous access needles, bagged fluids and many other medical items Nahuel can not identify.

Toward the end of the facility, they find what looks to be a miniature cafeteria of sorts stocked with human food. An adjoining door leads to another room with large deep storage refrigerators. Nahuel leads the way in and walks over to one of the bins and lifts the top open revealing hundreds of bags of blood. He grabs one, tears it open and sniffs. The vampires as far as the other room all stop and turn their attention to Nahuel.

"Untainted."

Jasper takes the bag and sniffs himself before tossing the bag into a rubbish bin in the corner. He turns and addresses the twittering crowd at their backs.

"Are you all so undisciplined that you cannot control yourselves in the presence of blood?" No one speaks, but stillness falls over the group. "Take the blood. Do not drink any of it."

The vampires filter into the room to carry out their orders as Nahuel and Jasper walk into the hall outside the cafeteria.

"Take me to the bodies."

Nahuel nods and leads Jasper down another narrow hall, smaller than the previous. As soon as they turn the corner, a pungent decaying smell infiltrates their senses and almost overwhelms Nahuel. Jasper takes over the lead walking over shards of a shattered door and into the room.

"Light?"

Nahuel feels the wall until his hand hits a light switch. He flips it and the room comes to life. He almost gasps, but stops himself, not wanting anymore of the putrid air to enter his nostrils. Instead, Nahuel curls his lips indicating his distaste.

Rows of bodies, at least two dozen, lay out in lines of gurneys before a large incinerator, all being human as evidenced in their mottled dead tissue and rotting skin. Nahuel's attention is drawn to a corner where a pile of limbs, torsos and heads have been thrown almost haphazardly. He walks over and toes the remains.

"Jasper, look at these."

Jasper follows Nahuel and bends down, grabbing a detached arm and inspecting it in a clinical fashion.

"This has been torn. There isn't any precision here, you see?" Jasper asks as his finger points to a ragged edge of skin.

"I think that goes without saying. Do you really have to get so up close and personal?"

Jasper ignores Nahuel's question and continues sorting through the human parts, tossing aside smaller bits and paying closer attention to the larger pieces. He holds up half a torso with one arm and a head full of long brown hair still attached. Dull eyes, probably once brown, stare back, a film of lifelessness with just a trace of fear left in them. Nahuel suppresses a very human shudder.

Jasper angles the body toward the rest of the pile effectively becoming the gruesomest point Nahuel has ever seen. "These here are new. Slaughtered."

"How astute of you."

"But those on the gurneys were ready to be cremated, like they've been dead for some time."

"So you think the dismembered remains were killed recently?"

"Today, in fact. I think this was protocol. And if you notice there is hardly any blood which leads me to think they had been drained prior to."

"Glad the vamps had time to eat before dying."

"Whoever was here was trying to cover their tracks, but I don't think they finished the job. I need to see the computer."

"Thank God," states Nahuel, "but you're leaving _that_ here."

Jasper shrugs and drops his flesh pointer.

They return to the corridor and pass multiple other rooms, all pretty much undisturbed save for debris from the battle, on their short walk to the computer. Right before they reach the computer, however, Jasper's eye is drawn to a room with a steel table and medical instruments strewn around the floor. Nahuel looks on confused as Jasper steps over broken glass and sidles up to the table.

Jasper stares hard and silent at the steel. He sniffs and brings his hand to hover over the table.

Following suit, Nahuel sniffs as well and the scent of something familiar saturates the air, but the feeling of familiarity is faint and distant and he can't quite put a finger on what or who it reminds him of. Nahuel focuses his senses on Jasper and the slight parting of his lips. A cloying trapped feeling of inescapable despair fills Nahuel until Jasper's facial muscles stops the pain. Every curve of Jasper's body speaks of a stony resolve and he draws his hand back without ever touching the steel before walking out past Nahuel's confused form.

"Captain?"

"I need information. Now."

Nahuel follows Jasper into the next room where the computer sits smashed on a metal desk. A large metal bin sits next to the desk with dying streams of smoke coming from it. Another table, against the wall across the desk, houses a row of smashed bottles. A large turned over bucket sits next to the bottles, presumably once holding water as the area is still wet.

Jasper begins at the table and immediately dismisses the contents.

"Destroyed."

He goes over to the desk and begins to assess the computer, calmly and methodically at first. He pushes the power button and nothing happens. He pulls apart the hard drive and retrieves the main blackened circuit board.

Nahuel raises an eyebrow and goes over to a large metal bin with smoldering documents. He digs in the ash, unperturbed by the heat. He hears Jasper at his back swearing, but before he can reply, Nahuel pulls out a jagged triangle piece of paper with readable names clearly printed on it. Nahuel pulls it close to his body and is inching the hand grasping the paper to his front pocket when Jasper grabs his wrist.

"What have you found?" Jasper does not wait for Nahuel to hand him the paper and snatches it from his clutch.

Nahuel lowers his hand, fist clenched. "I am unsure."

Jasper's hungry eyes scan the scrap. "These are names."

"Are they?" asks Nahuel feigning ignorance.

"Undoubtably." Jasper holds the paper up and Nahuel inspects it thoroughly. "Do you recognize the names?"

"Not at all."

"They may be the identities of some of our human victims, but whoever they are, I _will_find out."

"What of the circuit board?"

"I suspect it's lost to us, but will look it over more thoroughly in Volterra. Have a couple soldiers retrieve and ready a few of the intact bodies on gurneys for transport along with the blood."

"So home then?"

The paper crinkles in Jasper's fist. "Yes, I believe I may be owed some answers." Jasper begins to leave and turns back to Nahuel. "Destroy everything else."

**~o0o~**

**Author's Note: Many thanks to my lovely pre-reader tnuccio. **


	4. Once You Know, You Can Never Go Back

**The Otherside**

**Chapter Four ~ Once You Know, You Can Never Go Back**

_JASPER_

He stalks down a lengthy corridor toward the Volturi main gathering room, the throne room as Aro likes to refer. The hallway is gilded opulence to the point of being disgusting. Marble, taken mainly from the fallen Romanian coven, lines the floors and chiseled columns with gold moldings accenting the corners and edges. Sculptures and paintings depicting sexual positions, perversions and deviance intermingle with the decadence.

All of the unsubtle decor being original, of course.

Everything about this place is a reminder of hushed kitchen table conversations and rebels gathering the forces with blasphemous speeches. It is a reminder of oppression and hatred, but there is a power in such wealth. A power with which the Volturi delight in reminding the vampire world of.

Jasper remains unimpressed.

Three sentries block the door, all bearing the Volturi crest of four panels -birds and trees- nestled in a large V resting over the left breast of their tunics. Jasper always finds their symbol more than a little tacky considering both birds and trees stand for life in various translations. The Volturi stand for blood and it is only through death that they find their life. But Aro has always been one for theatrical irony and impressive displays even if nobody is watching.

Jasper is not really watching now, he is trapped in tunnel vision, all the gold and marble veins a blur in his peripheral vision. The overwhelming anger pushes him forward and consumes his forethought. Seeing the singular determination in Jasper's eyes, the outer sentries strengthen their stances at the door creating a line of barrier.

"You are not permitted, Captain." The middle sentry who speaks draws his height up.

"Then enable me."

"We have explicit orders to allow no one."

"Is it time to feed the circus?"

"Sir, I do not think it wise to speak-"

The guard's voice is cut off by Jasper's hands ripping his jaw off while the others stare in disbelief. The one second delay is all Jasper needs. He rears back and with all his strength, grabs the other two guards and sends them skidding across the floor into a distal wall. Before they can recover and rush Jasper, he bursts through the doors of the _throne_room to see the three leaders lounging in their chairs, almost bored at the mayhem Jasper has brought to their step. Caius raises an eyebrow and Aro continues to pick his teeth. Jasper thinks he sees Marcus narrowing his eyes, almost an imperceptible indication of attention. Immediately, the inner guards are upon Jasper and he is wrestled to the floor, face pressing on the grey Romanian marble. He snarls and a growl escapes the bowels of his gut. The guard pushes his knees harder into Jasper's back.

Aro rubs his tongue along his teeth before smacking his lips. He sits up and leans forward resting his arms on his knees.

"My dear Captain Whitlock, I must say we need to work on your entrances. You've got to make us really feel it if you want to make a real impression. But you are young yet."

Jasper struggles against the guard. Aro relaxes against his chair and folds his hands in his lap.

"Now to what do we owe the pleasure my young sir?" Aro grins almost maniacally. Jasper's lungs compress with the force above him and unintelligible air comes when his mouth opens.

Aro stands with inhuman speed, body rigid with arms straight at his sides and fists clenched. "How do you expect him to answer me when you are crushing his windpipe! Let him up you fool!"

Immediately, the guard releases the excessive force and Jasper uses the opening to fling him across the floor. Aro squeals and claps his hands like a schoolgirl.

Jasper focuses and takes in the room, always assessing. It is crawling with vampires wearing frayed gray cloaks, some so faded by reality it is impossible to distinguish rank by their shade.

Very few have the Volturi pendant in their possession, most who do have salvaged their precious metal from the dead, but the way of procurement is no matter to the _children_who wear the inadvertent hand-me-downs. They do so with a sort of pathetic pride like _they_are the glory and those days have not gone by. They stare at Jasper, the common grunt, with malice in their eyes and stand in their dying autocratic beliefs that their strength is perpetual and enduring.

It is not.

Jasper knew the changing of the guard was upon their kind even before he was offered Chelsea's necklace after she fell into the final death, but he needed no reminder of what is expected and needed no silly necklace to convince him of _his_ capabilities.

_Keep__them__close,__keep__their__trust,__you__will__be__their__general__my__Captain.__You__must__win__them__since__you__cannot__bind__them__as__my__darling__Charmion__did._ With his burgeoning madness in the face of losing power, Aro reached out to Jasper pleading with his offerings of soldiers. Jasper knew this to be a true sign of desperation amongst the Volturi leader - he yielded control to no one. The first thread of the ties that bind unraveled that day and Jasper stepped into the void to command, not with his pathokenesis as Aro thought, but with his strategic manipulations - a much more dangerous knot than any coercion of emotions. But those blinded with power and trying to maintain do not see these treacherous machinations.

The only vampires who look at Jasper with anything besides arrogance are Marcus and Jane. Marcus is too vague to gauge, but Jane scrutinizes, calculates.

Jasper knows the majority remaining "elite" stay for the status, most too young to know the difference, but a few of the old guard, the twins especially, stay for less than altruistic reasons - none of which are naive. Jasper has yet to figure out their end game, but plays nonetheless.

In reciprocal canniness, Jasper deliberates his next words. The majority of vamps are benign. Afton represents minimal threat and Demetri has been absent for a time due to being on assignment "protecting Volturi interests in the States" per Jane's orders. Jasper has yet to figure that one out. Aro enjoys a show too much to give Jane or Alec free reign. Renata holds onto Aro and is inconsequential at this juncture. Jasper has no plans to kill yet. The wives and Corin are absent as always. Caius' blood thirst extends far beyond these walls to care for the fine politics which will dictate his actions. The threats are always the same to Jasper - Jane and Marcus.

"Sir, I apologize for my over zealous intrusion." He hangs his head low in deference. "This cannot wait."

"Then speak." Caius speaks quietly, a glint of violence on the brim of his stare.

"I fear this best discussed privately." Jasper bows lower; humility best served eyes down.

"You dare-" Aro holds up a hand to Caius' rage.

"Surely such behavior and declaration out of our esteemed Captain would only come with purpose, am I right Mr. Whitlock?"

"Of course sir."

From a silent corner, forgotten in apathy, comes a rare edict.

"We will hear you Jasper." Marcus has already risen and is walking toward the private exit before he finishes his sentence.

**~o0o~**

The inner sanctum is small, five hundred square feet at Jasper's best estimation, and lit by electric lamps. Instead of marble, the bare floor and walls are an understated gray stone. Chairs line the walls, but they are far from plush. They are straight-backed, hard, wood - meant to keep those at attention, not comfortable.

He follows the older vampires through the entryway and thinks, not for the first time, that the space reminds him of a monastic sterility compared to the rest of the Volturi stronghold.

Across the room there is another door leading out to private apartments belonging to the leaders, their wives, Corin and Renata and the twins. In addition to Chelsea's necklace, Jasper could have been living in her plush accommodations right next door to Jane. Declining had been easy.

A large round wooden table takes up the center and majority of area. Strewn across the top of the table lies a plethora of maps; topographical, topological, nautical, aeronautical, geologic, transit. Pencils, measuring tools and rulers lay off to the side.

Jasper goes directly to the table and pulls forward a topographical study on the southeastern portion of the Appalachian mountain range in the United States. The map is covered in red marks depicting routes and possibilities. Jasper zeroes in on one large circle with several red X's within. He goes straight to one X in the lower right portion of the diameter and makes a smaller circle around it. He taps his pencil against the map.

"There."

Caius hovers behind, his eager eyes piercing the X. "You've located the rebels."

"To an extent."

"What extent?"

"There were…rebels there."

"You mean Cullens."

"Yes."

"Did you kill them?"

Jasper does not answer.

"Of course he didn't, Caius," Aro steps forward, causing Caius to begrudgingly make room, "He knows they are much more valuable to our fight alive. I am sure sentiment only plays a small portion."

Jasper bows his head, not bothering to contradict Aro's correct assumptions.

"Since you bring no one back as hostage then tell us what is so pertinent."

"It is not necessarily _who_ was there, but _what._"

"I'm getting increasingly bored, Jasper."

"My apologies, sir." Jasper turns back to the map and points to the encircled X once again. "We found a lab."

Caius leans forward, "In the middle of the mountains? Impossible."

Jasper narrows his eyes at the three leaders. "So you were not aware of its existence?"

"Do _you_ dare question us?"

"Of course not, Caius, but the rebels there were under the impression it was a Volturi strong hold and I had to be sure."

"Why would we put something apparently important enough to require such secrecy so far from our forces?" asks Aro.

"Because it is logical."

Caius sweeps his hand over the maps. "What is so logical about this?"

"If you want to hide something, there are only two places generally; in plain sight or so far out of it no one would look there. This is the latter and obviously, someone wanted its existence to remain secret."

Aro rubs his jaw in concentration as he stares at the map. "How can you be so sure Carlisle is not involved? He certainly is capable."

"Capable, yes. Motivated, no. The nature of this lab was obviously experimental and not the kind Carlisle would ever have indulged in."

The three leaders stare at Jasper expectantly.

"We found bodies. Dozens of them. Human. Many dismembered or severely mutilated. Any whole cadavers showed evidence of experimentation. It is my belief those alive were purposefully exterminated prior to our arrival."

Aro throws up his hands in frustration. "By whom?"

"And _that_ is the million dollar question."

Caius' face lights up with purpose and a fair amount of interest, almost like excitement. "This does change things my brothers. Do you have any leads, Jasper?"

"The soldiers are unloading a few of the salvaged bodies and I have some other intel that may lead somewhere, but I will need time to research."

Caius nods and turns his attention back to the maps as Aro paces with his arms crossed and right index finger tapping his chin. Jasper stands, legs spread slightly, with his hands clasped at his back, his stance becoming increasingly rigid with each passing minute as Marcus sits at his back. Jasper feels the slightest, tiniest, minuscule amount of tension eek from himself, but reigns it back in control. Just not quick enough.

From his back, Marcus speaks. "There is more, Aro."

Aro ceases his pacing and gives a one sided smile to Jasper while cocking his head. Aro comes directly in front of Jasper and grabs his hand before speaking softly. "I thought we were passed all this my dear Captain."

Jasper inhales deeply as the days complete events along with his feelings are not only brought to the forefront of his mind, but filleted open and striated like prime cutlets from a fresh kill. As Aro rips through, Jasper struggles to hold the tendrils of memories together and put them back together into a locked cell deep within the recesses of his mind.

Alice's face is zeroed in on and almost like touch screen is blow up. Along with Aro, Jasper sees her so closely; every piece of hair, the hospitaal gown, the wide expressive eyes filled with pure unadulterated relief, then confusion, and lastly hurt. Along with Aro, Jasper walks back down the tumultuous path of his denial, his footprints becoming ever increasingly sluggish with each step.

Aro withdraws from his mental assault and takes Jasper's face into his hands. He pulls slowly and as Jasper's neck begins to protest with the increasing tension, Aro's smile gets wider. Jasper clenches his teeth and his mouth spreads in pain with a desperate growl.

Aro lets go and pats his shoulder. "I understand your hesitancy, Jasper, Alice is a treasure anyone would want to hide, especially a forlorn mate."

"I told you, brothers, he could not be trusted."

Marcus stands and steps between Jasper and the two other leaders. "You know nothing of it, Caius."

"Beware, Marcus, you may make us forget our sympathy for you."

Aro cuts through the room, laying down an edict meant to instruct, to diffuse. "Now, gentlemen, this is all what the humans like to call just an honest mistake. Right, Jasper? A simple confusion with pesky emotions. Jasper will continue to fulfill his duty as always." Aro comes to stand directly facing Jasper and drops his tone low and flat; every trace of his sick jovial humor gone from his voice. "Won't you? My. Dear. Captain."

"Of course, sirs." Despite Jasper's better judgement, he bows so low in deference, he only sees behind his legs. He remains in this position until the three leave the room, especially Caius. Jasper has no doubt in single combat he stands a very good chance, but he is in their territory now and killing any of them isn't likely to be one on one of any kind.

Alone, Jasper rises and stays motionless for several more minutes, but his insides rage in turmoil. He exhausts his mental defenses attempting to control the tide of volatile thoughts. But his strength is not infinite and with an exhale the room vibrates with an onslaught of every piece of anger and hate he had been keeping inside since the moment he laid eyes on the girl.

The girl.

He turns over chairs and rips apart their legs.

The alive girl.

Maps and instruments become mutilated shreds on the floor.

Alice.

His hands pull half the table up off the ground and it is about to be overturned and pummeled to bits when from the doorway Jasper is distracted.

"Tut, tut, Captain. Such a display."

Jasper snarls and Jane laughs as she walks past.

**~o0o~**

**Author's Note: Many thanks to my lovely pre-reader tnuccio**


	5. Centuries Are What It Meant To Me

**The Otherside**

**Chapter Five ~ Centuries Are What It Meant To Me**

**~o0o~**

_ALICE_

"Here."

Emmett tosses on the couch a change of clothes including undergarments and a pair of fluffy house slippers with what looks like bears staring back at Alice from the top of the shoes.

"They're all Rose's so you'll probably have to roll up the pants."

Alice holds up the shoes and quirks her brow. "Really, Em? Bear slippers?"

Emmett grins. "Hey, don't knock 'em. Your feet are too small for anything we've got here and those are Rosalie's favorite."

"Yours or hers?" Alice asks as she gathers up the items and looks for somewhere to change.

The small room is really a combination of living area, kitchen and dining; sparsely furnished with the minimal creature comforts of a couch, side chair, coffee table and dinette set. No pictures hang from the walls or sit proudly displayed on table tops. A fireplace across from the couch stares back at Alice, cold and blackened from decades old soot. She sees a spider, one so small a person would only notice if it landed on their forearm, winding and weaving itself a new home amongst the cobwebs dangling from the grey stone within the fireplace.

Tattered moth-eaten curtains bleached from filtered light exposure hang from a small dirt tarnished window above the white farmer's kitchen sink. Even with her sharp sight, she cannot discern their original color. She does not see any color in this cabin, nothing says anything about who lives, or lived, here. It is exactly the opposite of the life Alice remembers, but what she suspects is exactly the life she has awakened to and will learn to live.

She spots a door where the living room and kitchen meet and opens it. A small bathroom, dusty from lack of use even though an obvious twentieth century addition, greets her and she goes in to change.

Through the shut door, Emmett's voice travels. "Well, maybe mine, but you know how she got when you used to 'borrow' some of her more preferred things."

Alice strips her arms from the hospital gown, but instead of falling to the ground, the shredded garment catches at her hip where the tie is still secure. Her hand goes to pull at the string and grabs pliable rubber instead. She looks down and recognition dawns; the bag from _that__place_. Alice brings the bag close to her face, kneading the soft material with her nimble fingers while watching as the remaining flat red liquid moves from the pressure. Definitely blood but not the vibrant type craved by her kind. She brings the open end of the tubing up to her nose and sniffs, immediately withdrawing, her mouth twisted in disgust. She gags involuntarily and tosses the bag and tubing in the small sink before looking into a cracked oval mirror hanging above.

Naked, Alice only sees the top portion of her torso, but instead of the flawless creamy skin she expects, multiple scars mar her body. Puckered skin zigs-zags across her chest in uneven lines narrowly missing her right nipple, distorting her breast tissue underneath. With a shocked clinical detachment, she sees in the reflection a finger trailing along the jagged edges and notes like a scientific observer, but not _feeling_, how no care went into this healing. The finger follows the scars to smaller, more precise ones on her upper arms, close to her shoulders, previously missed on her inspection of her lower arms earlier at the lab. They lay in lines, almost methodically cut, of about one to two inches long apiece. Alice loses count how many are there, but wonders what sort of tool could manage this handy work.

Arching her body sideways, Alice surveys the one wound she remembers and exhales in relief. The tissue generating at rapid speed shines raw and pink, tendons of muscle still visible in most spots, but it looks like the human blood did its job.

Alice puts on the donated clothing, pulling the shirt over her head last, and gives another look into the mirror before walking out. Red eyes stare back. Sadly, the color is the only thing that _isn__'__t_ a surprise to her, but holding her own gaze, she _knows_ she is the same. Regardless of whatever pocks her skin or mutilates her corporeal form, no matter the circumstances that distort her very existence, ignoring that half of her heart might as well been crushed by an iron fist; she _feels_ the same. Deep down in the very marrow of her bones, she is absolutely, unequivocally certain she _is_ Alice.

She grabs the blood bag and wraps it in her discarded gown before putting on her slippers and walking out of the bathroom. Emmett sits on the couch, his face half turned toward her, and she can just make out a slightly bemused expression. Alice thinks he is always so hopeful, but she is not feeling charitable.

"I know Alice remembers Rosalie's preferences, but what about me?"

His face falls. "That's not fair."

"I know."

"You're exactly as I remember."

"Funny, I feel exactly as you remember."

A bit uncomfortable, but still curious, Alice focuses on the coffee table where an empty cup with the dried crust of blood sits.

"When did you and Rosalie trade in bears for humans?" Alice asks, nodding to the cup.

Emmett takes a deep breath, indecision warring all over his face. "It's not that we don't hunt, in fact, Rosalie is off right now, although I suspect that's more for clarity rather than hunger."

"Has the world changed so drastically that there's a shortage on wild animal?"

"No, nothing like that." Emmett rubs his face and sits back into the couch. "We really only drink the human stuff when we have a mission. Rosalie seems to think it benefits us by satiating our hunger more than animal, allowing us to be prime for a fight. I'm not so sure I agree."

"No?"

"In the short-term, sure the stuff is fantastic, but afterwards, well, lets just say animals don't quite seem as filling. It's like getting someone all hopped up on regular cokes and then only stocking diet. Cruel."

Alice laughs, a tinkling sound infusing the room causing Emmett to regain his smile. "Only you would compare soda pop to blood."

"Whatever works."

"On the risk of sending Rosalie over the deep end, I'm hoping you can tell me where we are. Obviously, we aren't near Forks, or even Washington, I'd wager to guess. The air is heavier here and there is actually sun."

Emmett stares at her, measuring. His eyes soften and he speaks with a voice coming to terms with a new conviction. "We're about seventy miles northeast of Gatlinburg, Tennessee. My human family and I would come here sometimes for extended hunting trips when the ground got too cold to work on the railroads."

"So this is where you lived as a human?"

"Vacationed, you could say. Actually, this is where I was attacked by a bear."

"Oh, Em. Why come back here?"

Emmett waves Alice's concern off with his hand. "It's no big. You forget, I _like_being a vamp. Have you seen these muscles that came with the gig? And bears are no longer an issue."

Alice snorts.

"Besides, when we needed a place to hide, this seemed the most logical to me. No one really knew about it, least of all the Volturi, and I was familiar with the terrain."

"You mean Jasper didn't know about it."

Emmett's breath hitches. "Yes."

"He's one of them, isn't he?"

Leaning forward, Emmett takes Alice's miniature hands into his own. "Jasper didn't cope well and instead of letting it destroy him, he took the only route he could see."

"What, hate? I mean, I get being desolate, because I am now for him, and I even get leaving, but why turn to _them_?"

Emmett closes his eyes and squares his shoulders. "Because they could offer him something no one else could." Alice's head tilts to the side, questioning. "Revenge."

Alice is about to ask another question when an ice edged voice cuts through the room.

"Well, don't you two look cozy. A family reunion for the photo albums, I'd say."

Emmett hangs his head and lets go of Alice's hands before rising. "We were just talking, Rosalie."

She sweeps in, pulling her ponytail tighter as if to prepare for a fight and stands directly in front of the two. "Carlisle and Esme are right behind me. With so many of us here, it might be prudent to go ahead and snap our Christmas card photo."

Emmett rolls his eyes at her right as Carlisle and Esme come through the door. A huge smile breaks out over Alice's face and she rushes to Carlisle, throwing herself into him. She wraps her arms around Carlisle's chest and breathes him in.

Carlisle's arms remain at his sides, but after a second, his posture relaxes and he brings his arms around her for a light, quick squeeze before pushing her gently back and looking into her face. Esme angles between them and cups Alice's cheeks before pulling her into maternal arms. Gold eyes look at her from both of the people she calls parents.

"My dear, sweet girl. Thank God. Thank God."

The two women hold onto each other for a moment with a fierce sense of gratitude until Rosalie clears her throat. "Touching."

Esme sends Rosalie a heated look of annoyance. She puts an arm around her lost daughter's shoulders and they sit back down on the couch. Esme never lets go of Alice.

Carlisle follows them and stands adjacent. "I can't say this isn't a very surprising turn of events, Alice."

A shaky laugh comes from Alice. "You're telling me that? The last I remember we were all present and accounted for."

Esme angles herself toward Alice and grasps her hands. "What _do_you remember?"

Alice looks down into her lap. "I-I'm not sure." She takes in a shaky breath and everyone waits. "I remember meeting Bella for the first time when Edward brought her to the house. I remember their wedding and Renesmee's birth. I remember the Volturi."

"Anything else?" asks Carlisle.

"Um, yeah, I think. I remember staying in Forks, but keeping a very low profile for several years while Renesmee's growth stabilized. Charlie and Sue's wedding. Leah and Jacob starting college at Peninsula so they could stay close, although Leah would have rather gone to Seattle, but couldn't leave Seth in the end." Alice smiles at a particular memory. "Renesmee badgering us all to start school because we were _boring_ and she wanted to play with other kids. I believe she brought up the merits of early adolescent socialization to you during one of her more passionate arguments, Carlisle."

"Yes, she always was very persuasive. Tell us this; what is the last thing you remember?"

Alice moves herself out from Esme's grasp and starts to pace behind the couch, falling into thought. "That's where it gets hazy." She stops as if something comes to her. "I remember the party."

"Party?" asks Emmett.

"Renesmee's fifth birthday." She looks directly at Rosalie. "I made a cake wanting so badly to outdo your present that year."

"It was pink and had daisies on it. I didn't think you'd pull it off since you've always been shit at baking, but you took cake decorating classes for months."

Alice walks toward Rose. "I spent days on it."

"You were so proud and I actually got a little worried, but she would have loved mine better anyway."

"Would have?"

Rosalie squints her eyes. "She never got it. The Volturi attacked. We all had to run."

Alice backs away, her hands involuntarily waving in front of her. "No, no. I remember. We sang. I had that crazy vision." Alice bumps into the couch, but moves to the side and keeps backing away. Her face crumples in confusion. "I remember. She grew up. I had...problems, but she grew up. Right there. In her house we built in Forks."

Alice's back hits against the opposite wall and Carlisle goes to her side, grabbing her frantic hands. "Alice look at me." Alice keeps shaking her head back and forth, muttering incoherent memories. "Alice!"

She stops and stares at Carlisle. "But I remember..."

"Do you remember another birthday party after that?"

Alice squeezes her eyes shut, concentrating. "No." She looks at Carlisle again. "Tell me she isn't..."

"No, she is alive and in LaPush with Bella and Edward where the wolves protect them. They are far from all of this."

Alice's shoulder's slump and tearless sobs shake her body. "Tell me what's happened."

Carlisle leads her back to the couch before speaking. "It began the day of Renesmee's fifth birthday. We had been lulled into a sense of security and complacency. No one had heard from the Volturi in years and your visions had been quiet for awhile. You were worried, but I suspected it was just a side effect of being within the presence of wolves so often. Seth and Jacob practically lived with us at that point while Leah took an apartment close to school in Port Angeles."

Carlisle takes a deep breath and pinched the bridge of his nose before continuing.

"Everyone there the day the Volturi confronted us the first time were targeted. Caius and his lackeys spent years tracking movements and waited until our guards were down. They were very strategic and struck at the same time to avoid anyone alerting the others. I assume they had enough reconnaissance to know your visions had been...unreliable back then."

"Why would they do such a thing? We proved to them Renesmee was a natural child!"

"Alice, it had absolutely nothing to do with Renesmee and everything to do with Volturi pride - Aro's to be precise. He couldn't stand the thought of such a contingent of vampires contradicting them and with Caius in his ear about retribution, I am sure it didn't take long to convince him to strike back. So they waited and watched." Carlisle pauses. "What's five years to someone whose lived a thousand?"

Rosalie pushes herself off the wall. "Nothing. But we were stupid and let our defenses down. They attacked every vampire or coven associated with us. We were all in different places living our lives and because of their vigilance, they knew where to find all of us. Some escaped and went into hiding, but many died. The Denali were eviscerated."

Alice's face crumples in shock. "Our cousins?"

"Dead."

"Rosalie!" Esme exclaims.

The blond turns with a fire in her red eyes toward her adoptive mother. "You. You, don't get to talk to me."

Emmett stands and grabs Rose's arm, but she doesn't even notice.

"You don't get to tell me anything. I am sick and tired of all of you looking at me like I'm just the big bitch sister. I go out everyday and fight. I fight for a life I never wanted and I fight for yours. Where's Bella and Edward, huh?" Rose throws her arms in the air, "Hiding. Their off petting fucking dogs and watching our niece grow up. I haven't seen or even heard from Renesmee in _years._I doubt they even remember we exist out here."

Rosalie stabs her index finger at Esme.

"And what do you do, _mother_? You and Carlisle are too busy doctoring humans and renovating fabulous homes while we hide out in a pit and hope a squad of blood thirsty vampire soldiers trained by our _brother_won't sneak up on us and rip our heads off. Tell me, do you bake casseroles for the little fragile humans?"

"That's enough!" Carlisle's voice reaches an octave Alice has never heard from him before.

"Enough?" asks Rosalie with a hysterical edge to her voice. "No, Carlisle. It's not. None of this is enough to bring back Tanya or Kate. We haven't heard from Siobhan or Maggie in two years. They're no doubt ash by now."

Rosalie drops her voice low and it is almost a snarl sending shivers up Alice's back. "Emmett and I scrounge for vampires to help the _Cause_ and while we are called rebels against an empire the world doesn't even know exists, some days I have no idea what we're fighting for."

It is Alice's small voice who answers. "You fight for us, Rosalie."

Rosalie almost crumples in on herself, defeated. "How can I, Alice, when you're not even alive?" She shakes Emmett off and walks out of the cabin, letting the door slam behind her.

Emmett places a hand on his hip and the other raking over his head. "I'm sorry guys."

Esme, looking sympathetic, gives a small smile. "It's okay. I've heard worse from her."

He stops and looks at them. "You know it's been hard on her and I worry about..."

Carlisle puts a hand on Emmett's shoulder. "We all do, son."

Emmett nods and follows Rosalie outside.

Alice leans into Esme, trying in vain to let the comfort thaw the chill in her heart. "She hates me."

Esme coddles Alice's head, gently brushing her lank bangs out of her eyes only to have them fall back, while Carlisle speaks. "No, she doesn't. She's just disappointed in the choices we've made." Carlisle takes a deep breath and runs his hand down the back of his head and neck. "She's disappointed in us all, but I'm the one to blame."

"Carlisle-"

"No, Esme, I have done the same as she is doing now over the years as we've raised them. I've set before them high expectations to do what _I_felt was right in every aspect of how we lived down to our diets. I may have never shown the anger Rose does, but my disappointment was a good deal more manipulative and cowardly. Rose has every right."

Alice sits up and squints her eyes at Carlisle. "Why don't you fight?"

"I guess I've been stupidly optimistic that this misunderstanding...this war...will come to its own end. That we can find a peaceful resolve."

"Carlisle, I mean no disrespect, but that has got to be the most ignorant thing you've ever said."

Esme stifles a laugh as Carlisle's mouth quirks into a smile.

"Yes, Alice. Quite right. This has been coming. I realize it is becoming more difficult to just stay on the outskirts, especially after today's events."

Alice racks her brain, but comes up too full. She stares patiently.

"I've been noticing a string of disappearances amongst young twenty-something humans throughout the southeast."

"People disappear all the time."

"Yes, but not all are recently released psychiatric patients from Peachford Hospital in Atlanta."

Alice's face betrays nothing, but her innards boil. She remembers nothing but mere traces of long erased memories from her human days, but she remembers the information she stole from her past. From the _asylum._Papers with words like _psychosis,__incurable,_and _delusional._

She lets out a dead laugh. "Seems to be the _'it'_spot for vamps, those looney bins."

"I'm afraid you've got the gist of my suspicions. So far, I have been able to gather basic data on a few of the missing persons, but they're files are kept on site either in hard copy or hard drive."

Alice eyes Carlisle warily. "You think we need to go there."

"Yes."

"You think _I_need to go." It wasn't a question.

"Yes, I think this goes beyond Aro." Carlisle reaches into his pocket and pulls out a slim rectangular device. He taps the screen a few time and it registers with Alice that it's a phone. Taking a deep breath, Carlisle cups the phone in his right hand and gives it one last look like he is trying to be absolutely sure he is seeing what's right in front of him. He turns the phone and Alice is thoroughly confused by the dark skinned image smiling back at her.

"I don't get it."

"Don't you recognize him?

"Of course I do, but he's dead. You all said so."

"And that is what we know, or knew as it were. We knew Eleazar of the Denali coven was killed twelve years ago, but this man here," Carlisle points emphatically to the picture, "Dr. Eli Nielda, is very much alive."

Esme, quiet until now, speaks. "Nielda...Denali. You don't think-"

"I would gamble my life on it."

Grabbing the edge of the couch, Esme grips the fabric until the sound of thread ripping apart stops her. "But, why?"

"I cannot know, but I fear this is a lot deeper than Aro's burned ego. I think this goes back to the heart of our existence and what's coveted amongst our kind most."

"Power." Alice whispers. "They want the power few of us have." She looks up, fear widening her eyes into saucers. "_He_can find them."

Esme covers her mouth with a trembling hand. "But I thought he left the Volturi to avoid those practices?"

Carlisle's voice comes out soft, almost pained. "He lost his wife, his family. That sort of thing changes a man." He looks at Alice.

She does not look back, but at the fireplace and the spider now nestled in its completed web. "The bodies."

"Pardon me?" asks Carlisle.

"Bodies. I saw them in _that__place._A lot of them. They were laid out, like they were collected. I-I saw some with needles in them. I didn't know...I was scared and ran."

"Would you recognize any from pictures?"

"I'm not sure...when I woke up, I was so confused and there was this table and the bad blood-"

"Bad blood?"

Alice's eyes light up in recognition. She runs to the bathroom and pulls out the bag she stashed in her gown earlier. With a shaking hand, she presents it to Carlisle. "I think it's tainted."

Carlisle inspects the tubing and bag, letting his fingers run over the receptacle. He eyes the tubing closely, sniffing the end and coming away with an equally disgusted face.

"That seems to be the general consensus."

"You're right, it has been...spiked, if you will. I believe this blood has been laced. Based off of the color and what I can discern from the smell, I can definitely pinpoint the drug as diprivan, also known as propofol. It's used as a sedative to induce hypnosis, but it doesn't last long and needs constant administration. Generally, it's given intravenously, but this tubing attached is nasogastric and meant to go through the nasal passage into the stomach."

Alice rubs the space above her lip and thinks of the dried blood. "Carlisle, I think that tube came out of me." with a faraway look, like she is watching a movie rather than recounting events earlier in the day, Alice tells Carlisle and Esme every detail she can remember up to changing her clothes in the bathroom. She only describes the scars on her chest, but actually pulls up her sleeve and shows the fine lines on her arms.

Carlisle traces a few with his fingers. "These look intentional. Do you remember?"

Alice pulls down her sleeve. "I don't remember anything concrete between Renesmee's birthday and waking up today. There are some jumbled memories, but according to your timeline, those events seem impossible."

"I wonder if the scars were attempts to reach your blood stream to administer the sedative and when that failed due to your natural healing ability, they resorted to the nasogastric tube. It is also possible your mind compensated with dreams during your hypnotic state and that could explain the pseudo-memories."

"Is it even possible to bring a vampire to that state?"

"I've not experimented, but I think after today, it is obvious somebody is. Although I have no idea how everything fits together, I fear you play a significant part in their plans."

Any relief Alice felt at the presence of Carlisle and Esme had long ago been replaced by a heavy confining pressure on her chest. At Carlisle's words, the pressure graduates into an unrelenting vicious squeeze around her. If she was still human, she'd expect to topple over any second from a heart attack. She blinks rapidly a few times thinking each time when she opens her eyes, what's before her will be different.

But nothing is.

"I don't know what to do, Carlisle."

"I do."

**~o0o~**

**Author's Note: I hope my ten readers here ;) had an awesome Thanksgiving and even better Black Friday. Just wanted to thank those actually following this for giving it a chance - I know it's not for every FF reader, but I really just wrote this to get it out of my system and its the sort of story I like...so thanks for hanging in there! **

**I noticed I have a formatting issue with my italics and transferring docs from Pages for Mac to Word for post - I'm working on it. I really do know how to use a space bar. **Peachford is an actual mental facility in Atlanta, Georgia and as far as I know does NOT house rogue experimental vampires. I will be adding tidbits (like timeline etc) of information on this fic to my profile.**


	6. A Cemetery Where I Marry The Sea

**The Otherside**

**Chapter Six ~ A Cemetery Where I Marry The Sea**

~o0o~

_NAHUEL_

Far from the heart of the Volturi stronghold lies a small room where an amplified whir of machines thinking bounces in tiny echoes off the stone walls, filling the chilly air with a modern sound. A large semi-circle desk sits against the distal wall with multiple glowing screens on top, their blinking and beeping almost seizure inducing. Two other small work stations line the surrounding walls; one with a laptop, the other with various papers and writing utensils. Billboards with push pins, scratchy writing and lines connecting the dots hang from the walls. Rarely does anyone enter this room, the majority of the Volturi putting little stock in modern day advances, but it has had constant occupants for the last forty-eight hours. Jasper has always seen value where his superiors choose to overlook.

Nahuel sits at one of the smaller desks in front of the laptop, slightly slumped over. He resists the urge to lay his head against the cold metal, but cannot stop himself from rubbing his eyes. Unlike the sound of the oversized computer Jasper remains captivated by, Nahuel's brain slows itself until only a disjointed click rings in his head like a disc placed incorrectly into its player. Forcing a compromise, Nahuel's head rests on his arm.

"If you are tired, you may return to your room."

"I'm not tired."

Jasper tears his gaze for half a second to eyeball Nahuel's dazed face. "Apparently."

Feeling embarrassed by his lack of stamina, even in comparison with a full-blood, Nahuel only protests slightly in grumbled and garbled sentences before his breathing evens into a rhythmic sleep.

_It was absolutely amazing, Nahuel thought, as he looked at Edward and Bella Cullen walking on the earthquake fissured streets of Santiago ahead of himself and the rest of their party. Renesmee swung between her parents, a hand holding one of each. The girl-child glowed almost, but did not sparkle as the rest of her family. Her luminescence was not unique to Nahuel, but it was as enticing as smelling a newly bloomed gardenia nonetheless. Amazing. _

_At the chronological age of three, Renesmee appeared eight years old or so. Already, inklings of a tremendous beauty peeked through the veil of childhood. Her bronze curls swayed to and fro midway down her back. Nahuel's fingers twitched and he itched to pull one straight just to see how long her hair really was...to see if it really was as soft as chinchilla hair as he suspected. He refrained, knowing good things came to those who wait and he knew regardless of the mind or body's age, Renesmee would still be a little girl for a very long time._

_He's a very patient man._

_It was obvious the odorous man-child accompanying the Cullens on this trip was not. Jacob Black, as the dark one was called, shot daggers at Nahuel who smirked and never offered a questioning, understanding, or most importantly, a yielding look. No, Nahuel had no issue with being recognized as a predator amongst the rest of the killers. He let Black's internal jealousy build and stoked the fire with every lingering stare at Renesmee. _

_Nahuel's delightful torment of Black was only interrupted by the companion on his left inquiring to his and Huilen's decision to relocate to the city._

"_Jasper, I have had much time to contemplate this and find that while it is not safe for Huilen and I to reside amongst the more indigenous Mapuche outside of the city, we are hesitant to leave our heritage behind completely. If we were to encounter any authentic machi - the equivalent to a shaman - we would run a high risk as being condemned as wekufe or identified as Libishomen. The Mapuche oral tradition is still strong amongst traditionalists and we fear reprisal in the event of discovery."_

_Jasper nodded. "And within the metropolitan area of Santiago you can definitely disappear in the horde, but how can you remain in touch with your heritage?"_

"_Many of the Mapuche have migrated with modern times into heavier populated areas in search of economic change, but with their desire for a better life, has come unexpected consequences. Many of our forests have been destroyed for wood exportation leading to violent reaction from Mapuche activists. While some are trying to work within the system to ensure preservation and protection, many resort to more _persuasive _means to get the government's attention. Unfortunately, all that did was institute borderline inhumane anti-terrorism policies."_

"_It doesn't seem to be a very safe climate for anonymity, Nahuel," Alice chimed in as she went to grab Jasper's hand._

"_No, I suppose not, but look at us," Nahuel swept his hand toward the rest of the Cullen clan and Jacob Black, "We are not anonymous. It is foolish to think we can pass off as normal average humans. Your Bella is a testament to the futility of trying to remain under the radar. Instead, Huilen and I have chosen to chart a new course. One where we can use our influence and _special traits _for what is right."_

_Jasper's brow pinched and he asked, "And what exactly do you think is right?"_

_Nahuel smiled and his age was lost by pure naïveté. He allowed Huilen to distract him with fawning over a shawl Alice purchased earlier that day from a street vendor. _

"Shit."

Nahuel's eye flutters and his dream Jasper's face begins to swim and fuzz before him.

"Sonofabitch!"

Nahuel's eyes fly open and the Jasper sitting at the computer is a long cry from the inquisitive one from his dreams. His vision clears and Nahuel can make out the separated remnants of the hard drive on the desk. Shit indeed.

"What?"

"I cannot believe this."

"What have you found?"

Jasper rakes his hand through his hair. "That lying sack of cow-"

"Shit, yes I know. What is going on?"

Jasper turns in his chair. "Good, you're finally awake."

"I just dozed off."

"Hours ago and I've had a few breakthroughs."

Nahuel's stomach clenches as the familiar vice of failure takes its hold and he sits taller in his seat.

"I started with the names, but obviously I received thousands of hits. By cross-referencing them by region, focusing on the southeast, I was able to narrow it down. From there it was just a matter of finding a link, but there was just too much information and nothing obvious stood out. That's when I decided to try the hard drive."

"I thought that was destroyed?"

"Appearances can be deceiving."

Nahuel almost laughs, but the sentiment is lost on Jasper's excitement. "Always."

"I was able to access bits of data and thought at first most of it was random pieces, but then I noticed several names of businesses or institutions, many of which were hospitals across the United States."

"Hospitals?" Nahuel racks his brain and finds nothing, but isn't surprised. He is on a need to know basis. His job only concerns one task and that is circling the drain right in front of him.

"I ran a search on them and most specialize in mental disorders."

"Asylums?"

"Not in the traditional sense, but similar."

"Like where Alice was before."

Jasper's silence in the room outweighs the whirs and clicks of the artificial thinking aiding him. "Yes...while searching through the various facilities, I came upon a Dr. Eli Nielda."

"Do you know him or something?"

Jasper turns back to his computer and pulls up a picture and recognition dawns. Unable to help himself, Nahuel reads the bio.

_**Dr. Eli Nielda**_

_Director of Pharmacologic Research since 2015, Dr. Nielda has worked in conjunction with multiple top facilities throughout the world to research and develop new treatments in the field of Mental Health._

The bio goes on to say Dr. Nielda was a graduate from some prestigious school in the Northeast, but all of that could be faked.

"Isn't he that friend of yours from Canada?"

"Of Carlisle's. He is Eleazar of the Denali clan and evidently he _did not _die as we were led to believe."

Nahuel braces himself for an onslaught of unpleasantness as he silently begs for a Hail Mary. Jasper is too close. "Are you truly following these leads for Volturi interests or are you looking for _her_?"

For once, Jasper does not meet his eyes when he says, "Get ready. We leave immediately."

But Nahuel hears differently and it is the mantra Jasper has always lived by that Nahuel has only just learned - _always. _Again, as the day Huilen was slaughtered before his eyes, he feels the impotence of hope. He feels the futility of trying to dissuade Jasper from this course like trying to grasp mist in his hand.

His patience is tired; tried, tired and defeated. "You cannot do this, Jasper."

Jasper stands at his desk, gathering papers and discarding others. He rolls a few in his hands, the red ink outlaying a plan, destination, route, whatever. "I will do what I have to."

"We are Volturi now."

Jasper smirks. "Are we now?" Nahuel opens his mouth to respond, but Jasper is too fast, "We are all what everyone wants us to think we are, but in the end we all have our little secrets, don't we?"

"Aro will surely have seen your intentions."

"I have no doubt. I am also willing to gamble he is betting on me bringing her back. Don't ever forget that Aro is a collector above all things."

"You would do that to her?"

Jasper's face hardens. "Don't think that you know what I would or wouldn't do. I will find her, bring her back and find out who or what the hell she is."

Nahuel is on the verge of begging, grasping for anything. "They will kill her."

"No, that job usually falls to me."

~o0o~

Left alone in the computer room, Nahuel paces. He tries to figure out how to circumvent Jasper and stop this madness. He only had one job and that was to keep Jasper away, to keep him busy with Volturi interests so those who Nahuel has bargained with could set their plans into motion.

Nahuel ignores how ignorant he is of what exactly those plans entail.

He tells himself again and again the promises are enough.

It's becoming a rather broken record.

One day, shortly after Jasper convinced him to throw their lot in with these Italians, a dark figure approached Nahuel while he explored the lesser used corridors of the Volturi stronghold for a suitable place to set up the very room Nahuel is standing in.

He thought to himself as he carried a torch through the dark hallways how futile this exercise was. He thought how stupid they were for trusting these monsters and wondered how once again, he is rendered useless. But Jasper had faith in something beyond what Nahuel could understand and deals with devils could serve their purpose as Jasper spun a beautiful web of propaganda for Nahuel to buy.

Which he didn't, but Jasper was all he had left and he was also Nahuel's best chance. Nahuel has always been resourceful if nothing else.

Just as Nahuel was about to give up and go back to tell Jasper he could search the unused bowels of the Volturi pit himself, a whisper called his name. He followed the sound and it backtracked him to a small alcove which really was a cleverly disguised hallway leading to a room.

As he crossed the threshold, his fire went out. Brandishing his extinct torch as a useless weapon, he felt a tiny insect of fear crawl up his spine. "Who's there?"

"Put that down before you hurt yourself," the voice answered. It sounded slick and echoed softly, so much so, Nahuel could not tell if it was male or female.

"Reveal yourself!"

Laughter, hard and screeching like nails on chalkboard. "I'm going to forget my annoyance at you in light of the comedy you've brought me today."

"What do you want?" Nahuel's body began to match his voice in tremors.

"Not much at all."

But the figure did want so much more than Nahuel had bargained for. He sees that now. He sees it as clear as he hears the voice from the shadow of the doorway.

"Nahuel."

Nahuel stops his pacing and faces the interruption. He doesn't even bother to try to see the face or any identifying features.

"You've failed."

"Not yet."

"It's only a matter of time. Jasper will find her. You cannot allow her to come back."

He isn't sure what brought on the taunt, but the constant shaping of his life by the whims of others makes him weary. "And if I do?"

"Our bargain is void as is your life."

_So be it._

"Think carefully, Nahuel, before you decide. Do you honestly think Jasper will care for you after he reunites with his beloved Alice? Where will you be then? Who will help you exact the vengeance driving your every waking step? Who will protect your precious Renesmee?" Nahuel flinches at the thought of all of his hard work, his vengeance, Renesmee's life, being thrown out like rotted trash. "You see, we are so much more alike than you wish."

"I will do what I must."

He feels the satisfied smile. "As we all will."

~o0o~

_ALICE_

Barefoot, Alice stands at the shoreline of the riverbank where mud and rock press against the flesh of her feet. She relishes every pebble that rolls between her toes. Dense foliage and trees of varying thickness in the trunk line the water and gives a fleeting sense of privacy. It isn't much, but she'll take what she can get at the moment. Carlisle had hammered her with information and questions. Once again, he took up the mantle of leader and tension ran more taught and suffocating than a corset in the cabin.

The time since waking up had gone by in a tornado of activity and emotions and instead of days that had actually passed, it felt like weeks or months. But that was only until reality hit her like a sledgehammer, awakening her to a new reality. The one where she is alone.

Shedding her borrowed clothes, Alice steps naked into the frigid water causing ripples across the top as her entrance protests the natural path of downstream progress. Clear water turns murky as her feet disturbs the shallows and she walks until the depths covers her completely. Without concern for air, she allows her body to ascend face up and just stays there while her short locks of hair fan about her face in fluid spikes and her distorted breasts peak out over the surface.

With the gentle rush of water sweeping past her, Alice feels the dirt and grime slither from her body as a snake sheds its skin, but a tight sheath clings to her and before she can interrupt her floating to scrub away, Alice realizes it is nothing but her own tainted skin. No matter how clean the water, she feels dirty; the leftovers of whatever is left over from everything that is happening.

She wishes, not for the first time this day, that she could shed tears as easily as dirt. But she cannot and even the weightlessness of the water can't take the weight of her losses away.

Actually, it's just Loss. Singular. One person. One man.

Jasper.

But can she actually call him a man anymore?

A shudder racking through her body at the memory of the feral look of hatred in his eyes threatens to buckle her back under water. She lets her physical response win and drifts with a small splash beneath the surface.

The river, it turns out, is narrow, and as narrow as it is, its also deceptive. Instead of an endless abyss where she could temporarily drown out the world, she finds the depth of just above her head is about as abyss-like as the river gets. Instead of bursting through the flimsy ceiling of water, Alice twists and somersaults underneath. She pretends the water is washing away her pain, her imaginary tears, but no matter how many times she twirls and spins, the riverbed is too close and she is no match for the hard force of the ground. All she has done is disrupt the peaceful flow of the river, but it is a resilient force and without much work, resumes its movement as nature always intended around her; settling back into the natural order of things.

She stands and finds herself at a depth where the water only comes just above her hips. The muck filled cloud riled up from her underwater dance is already dispersing back to their home beneath her feet and she screams in frustration while batting at the water. All it accomplishes is splashing back with all the alacrity of a child's laughing taunts.

She feels an overwhelming _powerful _urge, what exactly she is not sure, but she _knows_ something new, small and just a kernel of a maelstrom in the water. Just a bud waiting for the right blend of sustenance to bring it into full bloom. A tiny thing for sure. A small seed planted. Black and consuming. Spiteful and hurting. A bad thing.

She feels the _hate_ growing.

"We have running water, you know."

Alice jumps at the voice, even though she knows it's Rosalie. Her arm comes up to cover her exposed chest, but it is jerky and undecided. The old Alice would have no qualms about exposing herself so thoroughly in front of her sister and although she is still Alice, she has yet to decide if this is the sister she remembers. Rosalie's gaze lifts from her mutilated chest.

"I know."

An uncomfortable silence falls between them and Alice lowers herself into the water until only her collarbone, neck and head stay exposed. Feeling a little out of sorts, she fidgets and moves about, attention completely on how this move or that make the water go this way or that. She especially admires how her skin slices through the liquid and only the rustling of clothing on the riverbank reminds her that Rosalie is still present.

Looking up, Alice sees her sister undressing, her ever glorious body entering the water like the Lady of the Lake in a golden splendor as her long tresses hit the water. She cannot help but playfully think _bitch_ at Rose's perfection. It is an old envy, one filled with benign sibling rivalry those in love are familiar with.

Far beyond her time with the Cullens, this is an old thing Alice misses; this comfortable way of just _being _with a sister.

She feels the water surrounding her heat as the hate boils and pops deep in her gut.

Now she sees her earlier mistake without _seeing. _Her losses are indeed plural.

Rosalie wades out to where Alice crouches and turns to float on her own back. Alice copies her and their heads almost touch as each is lost in their own version of melting away.

Alice contemplates the place they both find themselves in. A true sister's heart never wavers regardless of what comes from her mouth. All actions in the moment of any turmoil are temporary, therefore flimsy in their steadfastness. Alice knows her sister's heart and recognizes this gesture of joining her as one of a thousand words that Rosalie cannot speak. She takes it and accepts this gesture - at best an apology, most likely a grudging resolve.

Rosalie, it seems, is not so different at all. Alice thinks maybe it's just herself who has changed.

"Have you hunted today?"

"No."

"I suppose we have enough in our stores to feed from."

Alice remains silent.

"But I'm sure you already know that. Typical, you didn't even ask." Rosalie says the words without derision.

"Typical, you didn't offer."

Rosalie snorts. "I never have been good at sharing."

"Ain't that the truth."

Their bodies turn and they float side by side with each head facing the opposite way like the yin and yang and for them it just works. Alice reaches out and grabs Rosalie's hand.

"Do you think, if you tried harder, you could have _seen_ this?"

Alice sighs, not offended, but she understands. "I don't know. I think I gave up then. It was just easier. Remember when I fought so hard for visions with Bella? I sometimes wonder..."

"If we just left things as fate meant for them to be."

"Yes." Alice pauses. She knows Rosalie has pondered this question since the day she was born unto her vampire life. She wonders how much of an answer to her burning questions she actually wants, but can't wait for a decision to come from her heart. "Will you tell me about Jasper?"

Rosalie stops floating, drops Alice's hand and stands. Towering over Alice, Rosalie peers down. Alice meets her calculating gaze with her own begging one. "Please, Rose. I have to know what really happened."

Rosalie nods and dips back down into the water, her head close to Alice's. "You know the Volturi attacked us on Renesmee's birthday, but you don't know the aftermath. All of us ran and hid in Quileute territory. They weren't pleased by this, but protected us initially. That only lasted through the first battle. Carlisle spoke with the elders and given Renesmee and Jacob's special circumstances, they agreed to allow her to stay, but she refused unless Bella and Edward could to, so they stayed."

"The six of us left and went to locate our friends, but found most had met a similar fate. The Denali were dead...or so we thought, as well as Liam and Huilen. No one's heard from Zafrina, Kachiri or Senna, although Carlisle suspects...hopes, they have just gone deep into hiding. Nahuel eventually found us and that was right about the time Edward and Bella rejoined us to help."

Rosalie took a deep breath, an effort to subdue her voice's newfound shakiness.

"Nahuel told us they had been attacked in Santiago and he escaped just barely, but not before the Volturi said it was his father and half sisters who gave away their location for their lives."

"I don't understand...how can Jasper fight for the Volturi when they are responsible for all this death."

"He doesn't see it that way, and neither does Nahuel."

"Nahuel?"

"He's become Jasper's right hand, as it were. Shortly after he came to us, you, Jasper, Bella, Edward and Nahuel went on a reconnaissance mission hoping to gather information about where the Volturi were targeting next. They had grown in the years, turning more into a conquering army rather than just a band of imperious law enforcers. We had no illusions about fighting them off, but we planned to warn. Your visions weren't reliable so we had nothing but what we could physically uncover ourselves."

Alice stops floating and faces Rosalie, starving for her words.

"You five went to a station they held in Germany. We thought they were hunting the Romanians at the time, but really they set up multiple places like this with the hope of drawing us out. What they really wanted was Bella. You see, she was the one who truly insulted Aro and he has killed so many of us trying to get to her that I think we all forget what really started the war."

"You can't mean that."

"Of course I can. Why do you think he went to them? When you all went to Germany, you were ambushed. You and Bella were pinned by Felix. Jasper was with Nahuel fighting against some of their soldiers and Edward was the only one-"

Alice's eyes roll into the back of her head and her seizured body jerks as she sinks into the water.

_Terrified he would disappear in a cloud of ash if she let down her guard even for even a millisecond, Alice clung to Jasper in a fevered desperation. He gripped her even tighter, dragging them both deeper into the forested night. Occasionally, they stopped long enough for Jasper to sniff, listening to the secrets floating on the dust in the air, changing their course as the scent of their enemies crept closer. _

_Jasper's eyes stared back, piercing, calculating, blood red - a mirror image of Alice's. The human blood coursed through them with an almost foreign strength - it had been so long. But no satiety could belie the deed of making their eyes such a color._

_They couldn't rely on her visions anymore. Too many enemies, too many intentions. Plans within plans. The endgame had become so convoluted. Alice saw nothing but the decimation on the way to get there. _

_As their enemies approached, snarling putrid spittle, the lovers nodded to each other, understanding hanging between them like a crucible of carnage. Jasper gave Alice one more kiss. Gentle. Enduring. _

"_I promise to find you in this life or the next." With Nahuel at his side, he turned and bared his teeth at the army hunting them._

_She stepped over so many limbs and dead in her attempts to find her family, trying her best to avoid the piles of ash. She came upon Bella and Edward overcome with the graveyard in front of them, but still working diligently to set the trap. It was their last resort - a fail safe Jasper came up with for exactly this sort of situation. _

_She hugged them both, thanking some intangible source for sparing their lives. In her relief, she let her vigilance waver, long enough for the warrior to descend. Her mind registered one word to Edward - _run_._

_The warrior, Felix, as Alice recognized him, clenched her arm and she knew she was lost. Edward moved toward them and she pleaded in her mind louder than she could scream to take Bella and run. His face became torn and distorted as melted clay. She saw his personal war and calmed herself. She already felt Felix trying to rip her apart. Giving herself over, giving up to purchase the one second she needed to save her family, everything stilled and all that remained were her and Edward. He nodded and she mouthed how much she had always loved him. _

_Edward grabbed Bella as she flipped the switch on the small box before her. Alice heard the ticking in the distance, amplified by her own consignment to death. The sound became urgent and a pure silence enveloped her. She didn't hear Felix's promised pain or even the crickets bold enough to stay in such a place filled with violence. She closed her eyes, but the fire from the explosion was too strong to block out. Red heat danced through her eyelids and she smiled remembering how Jasper walked into that diner so many years ago._

_In the distance, the last thing she absolutely remembers, was a howl of such rage and pain, she knew it would stay with her for the last moments of this life and into the next._

Alice's eyes snapped open and through a liquid haze she sees a pale arm diving toward her from the surface. The arm encircled her own and pulled her up with breakneck speed.

"What the fuck, Alice?"

Her face wide with confusion and droplets dripping from her, she breathes harsh and rapid before stuttering, "I-I s-saw it."

Still holding onto her arm with an iron fist, Rosalie leans into Alice, "You _saw_?"

Alice pushes away the damp tendrils hanging in her eyes. "No, no, I just remembered." Alice looks straight at Rosalie so clear and everything makes so much sense. "I remember what happened that day. Felix caught me and I gave myself up so Edward and Bella could run..." She straightens and jumps, positively twittering with realization. "That's what happened! I _told_ them to go."

"Yes, we know this. Edward told us."

Alice's jubilance deflates. "Then why did Jasper leave?"

A pitying look overtakes Rosalie's eyes. "Because Edward listened."

Confusion dawns and Alice cocks her head.

"After they came back, Jasper was destroyed. He was just a shell for awhile and only Nahuel could go near him without being attacked. He didn't eat or talk or anything really, but Edward could hear his thoughts and toward the end, he knew Jasper blamed him and Edward felt the same."

Rosalie's arm comes around Alice and they walk to shore. Once there, they put on their clothes over their damp skin.

"The day before Jasper left us, something happened. He came into the room where we all were, I think we were hiding in Canada at the old Denali place, and just stood there staring hard at Edward. Next thing we knew, they were at each others' throats and it took me, Emmett and Carlisle to separate them. All Jasper said was 'You know it's true, Edward' and he turned around and left. Nahuel followed and that was it for about a year. Next time we saw them, they were leading a contingent of Volturi soldiers toward Egypt, probably scouring for nomads."

Shaking, Alice backs up until her feet hit a nearby log. She sits because she doesn't think her body can do much else right then. "What did Edward hear?"

"Do you really want to know?"

"Yes," Alice whispers.

Rosalie sighs. "Jasper thought that all of this had one source and that was Bella. He felt that if we turned her over, not only would we be reprieved by the Volturi, it would also satisfy justice for your life. He thought Bella should bear the consequences of her audacity and so should Edward for choosing to leave you for death."

Alice trembles at the thought of Jasper making such unwavering demands. Of course, it makes sense from him though. He was a soldier, but more importantly he was volatile. He reined in so much of himself to be with Alice and because she had to be with the Cullens, he compromised. He compromised to the point he became something he was not and after the loss of half of his soul, he felt owed.

She didn't agree, because she wasn't that jaded...yet, but she understood. Oh, how Alice _understood. _Because today, she felt owed too.

"So that's why Edward and Bella returned to LaPush."

"Partially, but I suspect my agreement with Jasper probably had something to do with it. Needless to say that put a big damper on my visitation rights with Renesmee. And of course Bella the Martyr was all ready to lay down and die for her people which lead to the Protective Edward Hero Complex taking effect. They rode off into the sunset of stinky LaPush that night. I'm not surprised Edward hasn't grown fur yet."

"You never would have done it. Edward and Bella know that."

"Don't assume to know what anyone would do when someone they love has been taken away. I would have damned Bella to the Volturi without regret if I really thought it would have made a difference, but I know better. They will never stop." Rosalie turns to walk away, but stalls. "And don't judge me for it because I like to think you'd do the same for me."

Alice isn't sure what she would have done, but keeps it to herself. "Why haven't the Volturi attacked La Push yet?"

"I don't know, but all I can guess is between the wolves' threat and mass human casualty it would cause would bring too much attention, however, there is something changing and I have a feeling there will be nowhere for any of us to run. You'd better get cleaned up. We're leaving tonight for Atlanta."

Alice stays where she is as Rosalie walks away. Her mind is convoluted with so much information that it takes her this time alone to align her thoughts.

It's not fair she thinks, how much has been taken. She isn't even sure the breadth of pain everyone has endured on their own level is something she can fully comprehend, but the hollowness left inside her at this new awareness is only an inkling she suspects. She is thankful to have been oblivious to the lost time and heartache, but she knows that too isn't fair. She knows she is being selfish, but she doesn't care. She may not have been sure what the old Alice would have done; would she have sold one to save all? She thinks no, but today is anew and maybe she really isn't Alice. Maybe she is the person who would do whatever it takes. Maybe she is capable of breaking all of their hearts, but then again, maybe they would understand. She knows Rosalie would.

Alice digs her feet into the dirt, pushes hard and fast. She shoves her body forward and digs in so deep, her forearms are covered. This time, since she woke up, she really means it. She buries as she claws without knowing it. Chunks of rock and mud hit her face, but they don't cut. She does this until she is spent and then stands up and walks away clinging to this new awareness of who she needs to be, leaving behind who she used to be, what she's lost, a little bit of everything that makes her _her._ She leaves it all behind, buried in a muddy riverbank, on this side of her reality - the one where she is alone.

Because she knows only alone can she fight to get him back.

~o0o~


End file.
